


Bed and Breakfast

by R_W_Daniels



Series: Flying To Wyoming [4]
Category: The Last of Us
Genre: Age Difference, Apocalypse, Drama, Explicit Language, Explicit Sexual Content, F/M, Humor, Lemon, One Shot, Relationship(s), Romance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-12
Updated: 2016-01-12
Packaged: 2018-05-13 08:46:47
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 1
Words: 23,075
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5702308
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/R_W_Daniels/pseuds/R_W_Daniels
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Halfway between his brother’s town in Jackson and the Fireflies at the University of Eastern Colorado, Joel rides an unnamed horse, escorting Ellie, a teenage girl who may be the last hope for the salvation of mankind. The road has been long and they are looking for a place to rest for a few days.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Bed and Breakfast

**Author's Note:**

> I’m back! After several months away, I’m finally back at work on my story. My apologies for the delay. I’ll go into more detail about my absence in the closing notes.
> 
> For any new readers, hi, I’m R. W. Daniels. I’ve written thirty chapters across two volumes, as well as a one-shot, all set in the universe of The Last of Us. Together, this mountain of words forms my big story “Flying To Wyoming,” of which this one-shot serves as an epilogue of sorts for volume two. For those who haven’t read the other chapters, I would suggest you might want to do that first before reading this one-shot, as this story contains quite a few references to the OCs and events that take place in those other chapters. Or don’t. Your call. This story is probably self-contained enough that you could probably jump right in and enjoy it on its own.
> 
> I’m glad to be back, everyone. See you in the closing notes!

**“BED & BREAKFAST”**  
**Epilogue To Flying To Wyoming II: Miles To Go**

 

The morning air was cool, and inside the deep shadows of the old house with the thick, rotting curtains of royal blue, the lack of sunlight made the air even cooler.

The place had been sealed up a long time, every door and window closed and intact. The air was musty. The roof had been leaking a long time now. In each room, the carpet was a ruined mess, and everywhere the wood was warped and cracked from old water damage. Black mold sprouted in abundance, covering as many surfaces as it had been able to reach.

The revolver was in his hand. His instincts told him there was likely no need for it, but habits die hard and careless men die easy.

The hinges of the pantry door were rusty and they squealed loudly, protesting at the disturbance of their slumber. The wood sighed and groaned, bent and bowed from decades of neglect, as it was forced open insistently.

There was food on the shelves. Boxes and cans and jars. Enough to feed a family for a month or longer. More than he could carry.

“Shit,” he muttered, his voice muffled by the gasmask he wore.

A long, gloomy moment passed as the man stood surveying the carefully stacked and arranged abundance left so long in isolation, waiting patiently, wanting to be found.

“Shit.”

He slammed the old door shut; the violent act proved too much for the weakened, decaying rot. The uppermost hinge ripped loose from the soft wood. The door hung there crookedly, sadly. It had done its job, guarding the food as well as it could, for as long as it could. The rust and mold and the decay that had claimed the treasure were things beyond its control. The roof had been leaking for six years now. The water and the rot that followed had worked their way down to the pantry, corroding the cans, moldering the boxes, ruining the food. Yet all the while, the door had stood firm, weakened but intact. And now, after so many lonely years, its duty was finally done.

The neglected wood gave a weak groan, protesting, lamenting, asking forgiveness, but the man was leaving, taking no notice of the plaintive sound. Tomorrow or the day after, the remaining hinge would surrender and the door would fall to the floor, resting on the ruined linoleum, to soften, become shapeless, and eventually disappear entirely in silence over the coming winters, forgotten. In another few years, the entire sagging house would collapse, letting in the long forgotten daylight at last.

**. . .**

Ellie was sitting in the saddle, bent low at the waist, petting the horse’s neck, singing gently.

“There’s a place I go that nobody knows,” she crooned to the horse, it’s ears up, listening to the soothing sounds she was making. “Where the rivers flow, and I call it home.”

Joel mused that Ellie was probably the first person in the amiable beast’s life to ever serenade it, and because the horse never seemed to mind, the girl sang to it almost every day now. Ellie needed no encouragement to bond with her new four-legged friend, and it always brought a smile to her lovely face, so Joel usually let it pass without comment.

“Take me away,” the redheaded girl sang, combing her fingers through the glossy mane, much to the horse’s delight, “a secret place… a sweet escape…”

She looked up as Joel emerged from the old house that sat out in the middle of a field that had once been a lawn surround by crops, all grown tall and wild, untamed. The old gravel road that had led to the farmhouse was long gone, claimed by grass and wheat and weeds. If they had been on the motorcycle, they would have sped right past, never seeing either the path or the house. Luckily, horses moved at a slower speed, better suited for sightseeing. And they were easier to take off-road too.

“Find anything?” she asked hopefully.

“Just a bunch of rotten wood and rusted cans,” he grumped, pushing his gasmask back into its protective canvas bag. “Nothin’ we can use.”

“Well, shit,” Ellie said with a frown, suddenly sharing his mood. She adjusted the rifle sling on her shoulder as she continued, “When you said all the doors were locked and stuff, I kind of got my hopes up for a good haul.”

“Me too,” Joel said, crossing the distance from the slightly warped front porch to the girl and the horse waiting in the shade of an enormous eastern cottonwood tree, it trunk so thick that four men couldn’t have joined hands around it. “Suppose I ought to be thankful the door was in such bad shape that I didn’t waste a damn shiv on a big bunch of nothin’.”

Ellie watched him walking across the overgrown lawn from her vantage point atop the horse.

_What if there had been trouble, Joel? You would have needed me. I should have gone with you. You’re more important to me than the horse. We could have tied him to a tree or something._

She didn’t share her thoughts aloud. Even since they’d ridden away from Jackson, guarding the horse had become her primary role. Joel said they couldn’t afford to lose the horse. Not with winter coming soon and so many miles still left to go.

_We can’t afford to lose you either, dummy._

“No spores,” he offered, seeing the concern on her face, but trying to give the impression he hadn’t noticed, busying himself by slapping the clinging dust of the old, rotted house from his shirt, leaving a thin fog behind him as he walked. “But it stank to high heaven in there, even with the damn mask. Bet you’re glad I made you stay out here with the horse now, ain’tcha?”

_No._

“Yep. Sounds gross. So what’s the plan, dude?” she asked, sliding back off the saddle onto the horse’s croup, the area over the hips and just ahead of the rump, making room for Joel to climb up.

“Still plenty early in the day. No point in stayin’ here,” he said, reaching up for the saddle horn, placing one foot in the stirrup. “Time for us to take off like a fart in the wind.”

Ellie guffawed, the unbidden eruption of laughter catching her off guard.

“S-sorry,” she cackled, covering her face with her hands, laughing, embarrassed, adorable. “S’rry!”

“You alright, Ellie?” He had yet to climb up. He stood there, ready to mount, waiting, watching her, faintly smiling, a little pleased with himself.

She tried to catch her breath. Snorted. Coughed. Grinned, red-faced. “Fuck! Why is that so funny to me?”

He smiled lopsidedly, shaking his head in mock disappointment with her. “You’ve been in the wine coolers again, Red? Can’t leave a boozehound like you alone for a dang minute, I swear.”

“Shut up!” she squeaked, trying to hold it in, laughing silently, rocking with it, hardly able to catch her breath. She couldn’t have explained why she found his choice of words so funny even if she had been able to catch her breath. “Ass!”

He pulled himself up, gathered the reins, and clicked his tongue. The horse ambled into motion, happy to be on the move again. It had fresh green grass in its belly and the nice girl’s song still echoing around inside its head. This was a shaping up to be a great day, as far as the animal was concerned.

The girl riding across his hips buried her face in the backpack of the man seated in the saddle (which was where people belonged, as far as the horse was concerned, not riding back there on his butt) and slapped her small hand against his denim-covered thigh, embarrassed, her laughter beginning to fade.

The horse heard the smack and began to move a little faster, slipping into a trot, just in case the girl’s hand had been meant for him. He couldn’t be sure, but always better to be safe than sorry. Besides, moving at a trot was more fun than boring old walking, especially early in the day when his legs were rested and the air in his nostrils was cool. Galloping was best, of course, but not so much fun when he was carrying two riders. Cantering was even more fun than trotting, he remembered, so he began to do that.

The world began to pass by just a little faster.

Yes, the horse decided, in its simple, horsey way, cantering would do just fine on a splendid day like this.

“Easy now, boy,” he heard the man say.

The horse ignored the words. On really splendid days, words didn’t count. Not until he felt the tug of the reins, anyway. In the meantime, he would canter. The girl bounced along, holding on tightly to the man, squealing and cackling anew, happy in that pure way that even the horse could sense. The animal liked the girl. She petted him often, and two days before, she’d climbed over a fence to feed him an apple she’d gathered from the grass around a tree that had dropped dozens of the shiny red treats. The gift of an apple was not to be taken lightly, doubly so if someone had to brave dreadful barbwire to get it. They were friends, the animal and the girl, forever and ever now, as far as the horse was concerned.

Hearing his friend being so happy made him happy too, so he celebrated by moving just a bit faster. The girl whooped with delight. They were both happy now.

Refreshing air rushed into his nose. He flicked his mane and rejoiced in the rhythmic thudding of his hooves on the dirt, the swishing of the tall grass that parted easily before him, the blue sky overhead, the wide open field spread out to the horizon. Somewhere ahead was another hard, boring road, but that was a problem for a later time. Horses rarely worried about the future. Why let life come to you when you can run towards it?

The man never tugged the reins. He was also happy with the pace the horse had chosen.

The horse wasn’t smug about it. It was too fine of a day to be smug. Besides, some things were plainly obvious, especially to horses, and even to things as strange as humans.

Everybody loved going faster.

 

* * *

 

A flyspeck of a town was up ahead, less than a mile away. If there was a sign along the road identifying the name of the place, Joel hadn’t seen it. Ellie would probably suss it out on the map sooner or later. She had to solve every mystery she found, rushing towards life like the young (girl or horse alike) always do.

The horse was walking now. The blacktop road wasn’t as fun to run on. Asphalt wasn’t as forgiving as dirt. It swished its tail this way and that, and wondered why the man with the reins didn’t want to travel in the tall grass on either side of the road, where the ground was softer and smelled good. People didn’t make much sense to the horse sometimes.

“I see you sitting up there, acting smug,” Ellie said. “Don’t act like you accomplished something.”

“Didn’t say a word,” Joel said, scanning the terrain ahead with cautious eyes, the corners of his mouth tugging up in a mostly suppressed, mostly smug smile.

“It wasn’t even that funny,” she said, a bit defensively.

“It was to you.”

“Yeah,” she grinned, working her knuckles into his ribs gently, unable to maintain her stern facade. “It was, kinda. Is that something they say in Texas?”

“It was something Tommy and me used to say back when we were kids. Can’t believe you never heard it before.”

“I’ve lived a sheltered life,” she groused affectionately and blew a short raspberry at him. “Nuns don’t fart, dude. I missed out, I guess.”

“Nuns never fart?”

“They say it’s the floorboards creaking. Or the house settling. Or a mouse. A big one, hiding in the walls. I don’t wanna think the nuns lied to me… but I have my suspicions,” she snickered.

Joel chuckled and it made Ellie happy. Laughter was just about the best gift you could give someone.

_Sister Abigail farted all the time when she was cooking meals for us kids. I think that’s why the kitchen was always so warm. Maybe those old stoves ran on natural gas?_

_Hmm. Maybe I should tell him that. Might make him laugh. Maybe during dinner tonight?_

She snickered again, heartily. Joel patted her knee affectionately.

_So many of us kids there. And not many nuns, now that I think about it._

_They never complained though. If they were struggling to keep us fed and stuff, I never knew it._

“I hope they’re okay,” she remarked wistfully.

“Who?” Joel asked, his eyes on the town ahead.

“The nuns at Saint Philomena’s. That’s the orphanage I used to live at, back when I was little,” she explained. “They were nice and kind. Good people. Man, I guess I didn’t realize just how good they were to us at the time. Not until I got out of that place… not until I really got out into the rest of the world, you know? Didn’t know how good I had it there, I guess.” She shrugged, not knowing how else to put it, still getting a feel for being an adult, seeing the world with anything other than a child’s eyes. It wasn’t easy sometimes. “I hope they’re okay, that’s all. I hope they’re still taking care of kids too. Kids like me. The ones with nowhere to go.”

“Boston’s still standin’, Ellie,” Joel said a bit noncommittally. “I’m sure they’re doin’ just fine.”

_But for how much longer? Just about every QZ we passed on our way here is nothing but rubble and rust… or else it’s full of bandits._

_How much longer can Boston last?_

“You’re right,” Ellie nodded, pretending that everything was going to be okay.

_I hope they’re okay. The nuns. The kids at the military school. Tino. Linh. Jamaad. Cherry. That turd Bobby who never missed a chance to paw through our underwear drawers during inspections. Riley swore he stole a pair of her panties once, that little asshole. God, even Skeevy Cheevers and his porno collection. All of them. I want them to be safe. I’m trying. I really am. God, I’m doing my best here, okay?_

From his place in the saddle ahead of her, Joel didn’t see Ellie’s lips draw into a tight, determined line. He couldn’t see her eyes close in silent prayer.

_I can do this. I swear I can. Just hang on, everybody. I’m almost there. It won’t be much longer. It’s gonna be alright. I promise. I’m almost there. The cure is coming. Just hang on, Boston._

_Hang on, world._

 

* * *

 

The day was warm. The town was empty.

“Don’t think anyone’s been here in a long time,” Joel said idly, adjusting his place in the saddle, easing his sore backside. “Not much trash blowin’ around. Not any junk piled up like you usually find when there’s survivors about. No barricades. No evacuation signs. No FEMA markings spray painted on any of the doors.” He gestured casually with one hand, “Look. Most of the windows on this whole damn street ain’t even broken. Hell, it’s almost… _clean_ here. Now that’s not somethin’ you see much of these days. It’s almost normal… like the way things used to be, way back when.”

He twisted around at the waist to give the quiet girl a reassuring, lopsided smile.

“Reckon a couple of tired cowpokes like us ain’t gonna do much better than this if we’re lookin’ for a place to rest the horse for a few days.”

Ellie giggled at the word ‘cowpoke’, never suspecting that he had carefully chosen the word just to bring a smile to her face. She looked around, wide-eyed, taking in the sights, looking for mysteries to solve and stories to keep safe and sound in her head until some future date when she would tell them to anyone who would listen.

The little town was run down and fading, sure, but compared to the virtually immeasurable decay and ruin of looted, post-pandemic, postwar America that she’d seen on the long, dangerous road west, a place that was merely dilapidated and unkempt by comparison was an almost magical sight.

“Man! It’s like a postcard or something!” she enthused, her face awash with awe, her imagination already papering over the cracks, cleaning up the streets, repainting the faded buildings, and filling the town with life. “Wish I could have seen this place when it was, y’know, full of people.”

“Whole world used to be filled up with people,” Joel shrugged, a little wearily. “Maybe it will be again… one of these days… after the Fireflies… I don’t know… do whatever it is they think they can do with you…”

Ellie kept silent, listening to Joel work through his thoughts. She slipped an arm around his waist and held him as he looked off into the distance.

“I dunno…” he continued after a moment. “Maybe Marlene was right… maybe they really can find the cure… Get it out to folks… somehow… maybe… Then we can put all this roamin’ around behind us… Put down roots again… Settle down someplace safe…”

“Someplace like Tommy’s?” she asked.

“Yeah, like Tommy’s.”

“Think they’d be okay with me staying too?”

“Sure. Tommy said there’s a place for us there, kiddo. Remember?”

“He said that to you, Joel.”

“He said it to both of us, Ellie.”

“You think?” she asked. “I mean, I _hope_ he did… but…”

Joel placed his hand over hers, where it rested across his stomach. She smiled. When he spoke again, his voice was low, smooth, gentle.

“Tommy’s got a big heart, Ellie. I know you barely got to talk to him. Reckon you’re just gonna have to trust me on this one. I know my baby brother. He won’t leave you out here in this mess to fend for yourself. No way Tommy’d ever do something like that to anybody who needed help. And besides, I wouldn’t settle in Jackson without you. Don’t you even worry about that.”

She smiled, rested her head against his arm and shoulder, her heart swelling despite the cold feeling of dread forming in the pit of her stomach.

“Thanks,” she murmured. “But that’s just Tommy’s vote. What about the rest of the people in Jackson? What do you think they’re going to say when we come riding back into town?”

“Maria sure seemed to take a liking to you. And Tommy said she runs the place. And she’s married to him, for Christ’s sake. So we got the backin’ of the mayor and her husband, yeah? And besides, the crew I met at the dam? They seem like good folks. Regular bunch of churchgoers, every one of them, I betcha. Way I figure it, folks like that ain’t gonna turn a teenage girl away just because she stole one of their horses. People like that love the notion of second chances. Forgive and forget, and all that stuff. So don’t you worry about that no more, alright?”

“Okay.” She nodded and kept a reassuring smile on her lips. She knew that Joel needed to see that she believed him. Joel needed looking after in his own way, as she had come to understand in their time together.

_They can love Jesus all they want… But what will they say when they find out I’m infected? Even the nicest nuns at the orphanage wouldn’t put up with something like that._

“We’ll make one more ride through town again,” he said, turning his attention back to the streets. “If we still don’t see any sign of anybody, then we’ll start checkin’ inside the buildings.”

“Sounds like a plan, boss.”

 

* * *

 

The evacuation, whenever it had happened, must have been a very organized, unhurried affair. These people had left calmly, from the signs of it.

”No shootin’. No lootin’,” Joel mumbled to himself. “Whole town just packed up and left without a fight, just as nice as you please.”

He shook his head at the wonder of it.

I remember killing a man over a case of Diet Coke and a box of cheap plastic combs, Joel thought to himself. Always a market for shit like that. Guess that guy had the same damn idea. Couldn’t have been planning to use them all for himself. Guy was losing his hair anyway, just like Original Matt. Where the hell was that anyway? San Antonio? Houston? It was before Matt died, I’m pretty sure of that.

He pushed the unwanted memory out of his mind.

Focus on the here and now, jackass. You didn’t make it all this way just to get dumb and get yourself killed this close to the finish line.

He sighed. Foraging wasn’t going so well today.

The store shelves in this unnamed little town were picked clean of any food or ammunition. Even a careful search of the hardware store had yielded only a few bits of useful scrap. He and Ellie were going house by house now, tossing the old homes for anything of value.

Joel looked around living room. The sofa cushions were in the corner where he had tossed them. People in a hurry to get out often left all sorts of forgotten goodies in and under their furniture. Sometimes a diligent couch excavation could produce a useful item or two. But other than several worthless coins and an old button, this particular treasure hunt had been fruitless.

“Either they had plenty of time to pack before they left,” he muttered softly to the empty room, “or these people kept a hell of a clean house.”

He sighed again and gave the room another scan, double-checking to ensure that he had searched everywhere.

Jesus, I remember that woman with the kitchen knife. Right after the outbreak. The second night after me and Tommy tried to get out of Bastrop. Or was it the third night? It was right before we got let into the Austin Triage Center. It was dark as hell that night, I remember that for sure. The power was going on and off, nobody was really in charge, not that we knew that at the time. We still believed the government people on the radio and the TV. Crazy woman. I would’ve split the damn haul. Big brown trash bag full of Doritos and Ruffles and stuff. Must have had twenty bags I stole from that Circle K. Tommy smashed the big window with a crowbar. I would’ve split the damn chips with her. Maybe not fifty-fifty, but I would’ve let her have some of them. A little bit, anyway. Things were bad and everybody was crazy. But we weren’t so fucking desperate that we’d kill each other over a goddamn Hershey bar, not like it got to be later. Not like it was when winter rolled around. Not yet anyway. She was screaming something about her kids. Jesus. I would’ve shared some of the damn food. But she wouldn’t stop swinging that knife at Tommy.

Irritated with himself, Joel sighed once more, a tired, old sound, even to his ears. He glanced out the window, making sure that the horse was still safe by the old pull-behind camper rusting away in the backyard, were they’d left him, his reins snug around the rusting frame. On the other side of the dirty glass, the animal took no notice of Joel; its attention was solely on the tall, delicious grass.

Ellie wasn’t with the horse this time. She had insisted on helping with the searches. She claimed her butt was tired from sitting in the saddle all morning. Joel could sympathize with her. His ass had been sore every day since they’d ridden away from Jackson.

Been years since I was on a horse, Joel reflected. Still getting used to it, I guess. Not like it used to be. Seems like I was on one every other weekend that I didn’t have a job lined up. Sarah used to love ridi-

He grimaced, angry with himself, and stared at the ceiling until the moment passed.

From the kitchen, an energetic, nonsense buzzing sound wafted out to his ears. He smiled, grateful for the distraction, as his mind decoded the familiar noise. Ellie was grinding and shredding her way through another vigorous oral guitar solo.

Gonna teach her how to play a real guitar one of these days, he mused silently, and strode towards the kitchen. Better not wait too long. She keeps making that noise, she’s gonna rattle the teeth right out of her skull.

The girl was kneeling on the old counter top, her arms and head inside an open cupboard, singing softly, mostly on key, her voice distorted by the confines of the wooden space around her head as she searched.

“It’s been a long time comin’! Now you better get runnin’! And you better get ready to die!” she sang huskily, her voice as deep as she could make it, trying to sound like the guy who had sang this song to her so many times from the old CD player she had shared with Riley in their Boston dorm room. Almost growling, she launched into the chorus with abandon. “Get ready to die! Get ready to die! Get rea-“

Joel spoke as he came around the kitchen table to her. “Don’t you know any… y’know, _happy_ songs?”

She straightened up, emerging from the cupboard, sitting back on her heels, happy to see him. She pushed her bangs away from her beautiful face and beamed a smile at him that made his heart ache.

An image of her, naked, on her knees, her mouth open for his cock, her small hands guiding it to her lips, flashed across the back of his mind, and he felt the familiar sting of lust and guilt again.

“Not a fan of my choice of music?” she teased, not naked, not sucking his cock, not anything but his devoted sidekick for the moment, innocently unaware of how he was seeing her in this moment. “I can understand. It’s music for _young_ , attractive people who _enjoy_ having fun. One of these days I’ll teach you about this stuff.”

The denim of her jeans was taut across her thighs as she knelt on the counter. He remembered how smooth those legs were, how flawless the skin. She was naked in his mind again, like she had been in the little shack in the mountains outside of Jackson. Young. Ready. Wanting. He had sprayed such a large, hot load across her perfect little tits. Her finger had slid through the thick, slick mess, and she had studied it experimentally as he leaned against the wall, gasping, his balls aching from the release. She was curious, this one. She loved doing new things. She loved being taught. She loved making him come. She loved coming for him. She loved being spanked.

Jesus, the sounds she makes once I’ve got her ass good and red…

His cock began to move inside his pants, remembering.

Never should have crossed that bridge, he thought glumly, regretting what he’d done, looking forward to doing it again, keeping his expression carefully neutral.

But I did it. And there’s no going back now.

“A song? Is that what that was?” he asked, needling her a bit, not taking her bait about his age or mood. “Huh. How about that? Did you know I couldn’t be sure until you told me just now?”

She stuck her tongue out at him, an adorable, girlish thing to do. That tongue felt so good on his cock, he recalled.

“Find anything in there, squirt?”

“Yep!”

She dropped down from the countertop in that easy, boneless way the young do, and trotted over to the sink where she had gathered a small pile of items. The hunting rifle was there too, propped against the door of the refrigerator – whatever food was left inside that old, unpowered thing had been left undisturbed for decades, and both of them knew from experience it was best to leave the ancient, entombed denizens inside undisturbed.

“Check it out! You can use this for cooking dinner tonight!” she chirped, holding out a blue and green box of Reynold’s Wrap aluminum foil. The words on the side of the carton proudly proclaimed ‘One hundred percent recycled’. Her white teeth gleamed as she finished with a flourish. “Annnnnnnd guess what’s gonna be on the menu!”

“What?” he asked, taking the offered carton of foil. He could see her other hand was behind her back, concealing something.

“ _Guess!_ ” she insisted, leaning forward a bit, bouncing on the balls of her feet, almost hopping in place, clearly proud of herself.

“Chili?”

“Nope. Guess again.”

“Beef stew?”

“Nope! Guess again.”

He crossed his arms. The guessing game was done.

“Almost as good as beef stew,” she said, unperturbed, revealing the small red box with a flourish. “Jello!”

“Hey, alright,” he said, somewhat pleased. “Good find.”

“Cherry flavored,” she added. “The good stuff. Proud of me?”

He hid his smile as well as he could in the face of her adorableness. “Find some Chili to go with that, and I might be.”

“Ugh!” she rolled her eyes dramatically, playing along. “There’s just no pleasing some people. I’m talking about the Jello-hating people. Grumpy old Jello-hating, music-hating people especially! They’re just the worst!”

“It’s a good find, Red,” he chuckled, crossing the old tile floor with three thumping steps of his boots. He reached out to tousle her ponytail. “Ain’t had Jello in a while.”

“ _Cherry_ -flavored Jello,” she insisted sweetly, darting in close, hoping for a hug. “Second best Jello flavor there is.”

He wrapped his arm around her for a quick squeeze. She wanted to nestle into him but the hug was done. He was already on his way to the sink to inspect the other treasures she’d found.

_Come back here, you ass. I haven’t told you what the best Jello flavor is. Don’t you care about important stuff like this?_

_Gimme a better hug than that, damn it! Hug me like you mean it._

_And maybe smack my butt when you do._

She grinned at the thought.

“Good haul,” he said with a small nod.

“Damn right, it is!” she replied, moving in close to him again, her eyes going from his face to his hands and back again as he sorted through the loot.

_I love watching your hands. Is that weird?_

“Those are some high quality goodies, buddy,” she said, seeing the approval on his face when he held up a small matchbook that was not entirely empty of matches.

She was bright, cheery, full of energy, like she usually was, Joel reflected. She hadn’t played ‘made you look’ or any dumb kid stuff like that in a long while. She was acting more grown up.

She was more grown up.

And he’d had a hand in that, for better or worse.

“We’ll need to scrounge up some gasoline or some firewood,” he said. “The camp stove is almost out of gas. Remember to check the laundry room. We might find some lint. We’re almost out and the dew’s gettin’ heavier every mornin’.”

“So…” she began, working the toe of her sneaker against the tile floor. “You said we were gonna rest the horse here? For a couple of days? Right?”

He shrugged, slipping off his pack, already dividing the loot into what he would carry and what he would entrust to her. “That’s what I’m thinkin’, yeah. We’re more than a week out from Jackson. And probably about a week from the University, give or take a day or two, accountin’ for the way we’re stayin’ off the main roads now. I figure the horse could probably do with a rest. A short one. The snow’s gonna be here soon and we sure as hell don’t wanna get caught outdoors without a good winter camp when it hits. But I figure we can afford to rest for a day or two.”

She inched closer. He stood still, squeezing one of several small foil packets of Domino’s Pizza crushed red pepper delivered to this kitchen years and years ago. He studied the pepper packets, feigning interest in them, pretending not to notice what she was doing, letting her come into his orbit.

“Good plan,” she said, trying hard to sound casual like a badass, seasoned adventurer and not a suddenly horny teenage girl who could barely contain herself. “We… uhh… could probably do some laundry too, y’know? There’s that big creek we saw. It’s not too far from here. The water looked clean.”

He grunted in the affirmative, dropping the pepper into the breast pocket of his flannel shirt. His cock was half hard.

She eased against him, her body warm and inviting. She sighed happily, sweetly, erotically, at the contact. It made his cock leap up. Fully erect, it pressed against the front of his jeans invitingly. He frowned a little. There was no way she couldn’t notice what was going on down there.

His hand found her shoulder and pulled her in. She rested her head against him, looked down, and drew in breath sharply, surprised, delighted. Her voice was so soft it barely carried up to him.

“oh”

A wonderful sound to his ears.

_Fuck, Lil’ Joel! You’re like a tractor beam or a brain scrambler or something! How do you do that to me?_

She hugged him close with one arm. Her free hand began to reach out.

“so cool”

Kept my hands off you ever since the shack, Ellie. Don’t think I can hold out much longer.

Her small hand roamed across the warm bulge. It strained pleasantly under her fingers. Her voice cracked when she spoke.

“S-so… you, um… you wanna spend the night right here? … This house seems, y’know, pretty nice.”

_Only when we’re safe behind locked doors. That’s the rule. Your rule, Joel. It’s been ages and ages since we got naked together. Let’s lock some fucking doors tonight, buddy._

Joel cleared his throat. Her hand remained where it was, exploring him in small circles. It took him a second to find his words.

“Couple too many broken windows, if you ask me. Probably ought to check the last few houses near the edge of town. Find one with sturdier doors. And a garage, if we can.”

“Garage?” she mumbled, distracted, eyes still fixed on the same spot as before. “Oh! For the horse, right?”

“Smart girl,” he said, and gave her shoulder a good squeeze. She squeezed him softly with her fingers.

When she looked up at him, her eyes were filled with promises.

 

* * *

 

Ellie peered in through the dirty glass. This house was tall, three stories. The front porch had its own little roof and a bunch of fancy posts lining the steps up to the railing-lined platform and the door. Each post of the safety rail had been hand-worked into ornate cylinders. There were five big windows just on this side of the house; three of them low enough for her to get to. Two of them were tall, narrow rectangles on either side of the door. There was something strange about all of the windows: they were crisscrossed with metal frames, cut into diamond patterns, reminding her of a chain link fence, and though the glass was clear, it distorted everything, just a little bit, in a strange, slightly rippling way.

“Man, this weird glass is so thick!”

“Old house,” Joel said, working at the locked door with a shiv, “built to last. Probably leaded glass or something like it. And ain’t you supposed to be keepin’ watch?”

“ _I am_. I’m looking for booby traps,” she said, which was mostly true. “Tripwires. Coffee can bombs. Ropes tied to old refrigerators hanging from the ceiling. The kind of stuff Bill would do.”

“Don’t remind me.”

“Shotguns pointed at the door with strings tied to the trigger. Y’know, stuff like that shit we saw back in that creepy town with the pawnshop,” she continued, proving her point. “I’m looking out for _you_ , man. Don’t want you losing your pants again.”

“Alright then,” he grunted, letting it slide. That town had been crawling with infected and ruled over by one crazy survivor. This town was much better, much safer. It was completely empty and had been for a long time, but there was no reason to get sloppy and let your guard down because of it. Bad habits got you killed. “You lookin’ out for the horse too? Or just me?”

Ellie did a quick check.

“He’s right where we left him, boss. Tied to the mailbox. And what the heck’s ‘leaded glass’ anyway?”

“Old way of makin’ glass,” he grunted, frustrated with the lock, expensive and well made, just like the windows. “My grandma called it ‘flint glass’. Ever seen a stained glass window?”

“Duh. Raised by nuns, dude. I went to church, like, all the fucking time,” Ellie snarked, looking in through another one of the odd windows, the rifle in her hands, just in case.

“Same stuff, kiddo. Just not colored, yeah? As clean and pure as these here are, they’re probably real expensive stuff. I put some of it in a few times, back when me and Tommy worked construction. Sure wasn’t cheap, I can tell you that. Mostly doctors and lawyers and that sort were about all that could afford it.” He hissed through his teeth, sure the blade was going to snap before the lock gave. No going back now. “I sure as hell couldn’t.”

“How do they make stained glass all those different colors?” she asked, peering around the side of the house, seeing even more windows sparkling above the tall weeds that had probably been a flower garden once upon a time. She made sure to raise her voice so Joel could hear her from his place on the porch.

“No idea. And keep your voice down. Just in case.” he said, the lock giving up the fight at last. The shiv was bent and chipped. Ruined. This battle had been a draw. He threw the spent blade across the porch with a clatter. He pushed the door open and stale air, made warm by layers and layers of expensive insulation packing the walls of the old house, washed over him. No mold. No rot. Clean air.

He heard her feet swishing through the tall grass as she jogged across the front lawn. She trotted up the porch steps and followed him inside. With one more backward glance to verify the welfare of the horse, Joel closed the door. No sense in letting all the warm air out on a cool October day.

At the edge of the road by the mailbox, the horse stood in the tall grass and watched them disappear from sight. Vague, instinctual unease began to fill the beast. He knew to the marrow of his bones that there was safety in numbers. Being alone was never good. The man and the girl were friends and protectors. They were predators too, but friendly ones. Their eyes were on the front of their heads and they walked in straight lines, but they could be trusted because they had just the two legs. And without the safety of a proper herd, the horse relied on them entirely for protection. They were safer together, didn’t they know that? Didn’t people know anything?

He whinnied. No one heard him. He wasn’t afraid. Not yet. But he hoped they would come back soon.

He worked the grass with one hoof nervously, waiting for their return, and munched a mouthful of the sweet green stuff to distract himself. It was all he could do.

**. . .**

Ellie whistled in approval. She had been practicing since Pittsburgh and it came easily to her now.

“Holy cow, Joel. Pretty fucking fancy, huh?”

“Sure is.”

The furniture must have been old even before the outbreak, but Ellie could see there was something different about it compared to most of the furnishings she had seen in the many, many abandoned houses she and Joel had looted on their journey. ‘Ikea crap’ Joel had called most of it. The floors were hardwood, dusty, but intact, and covered with heavy rugs that must have been impressive in their time.

By the front window, a pair of fancy chairs flanked a funny little table with a couple of big, classy-looking books on top. The seats were leather, not vinyl, and still mostly intact, not split apart with their stuffing hanging out in clumps around the bases of rusty springs. She wiped the thick layer of dust from the cushion and sat down. The old, stained wood creaked a bit but took her weight easily.

She picked up the top book from small stack on the strange little table. The cover was made from leather, embossed with words written in a neat, curling script.

_The Philobiblon. Codices Latini Haunienses. Ricardus de Bury._

_Holy shit these are some fancy words. I’m not even going to try to say any of that out loud._

She put the book back down, wondering if she’d have time to flip through it later.

She looked around the room happily.

“A girl could get used to sleeping in places like this.”

“Yeah, I reckon I spoil you, that’s for sure.”

“Not nearly enough, if you want my opinion.”

“Yeah? Only a spoiled girl would just sit there like a queen while I do all the searchin’.”

Ellie sat back imperiously and clapped her hands twice. She spoke in her best fancy lady voice.

“Bring me my afternoon tea, Jeeves. Then prepare my finest pony for an afternoon ride through the royal hedge maze. Quickly now! That’s a good lad!”

“Maybe I oughta make you sleep in the back yard tonight,” he said. “Me and the horse can share the house. He’s a good horse. He works hard and does his part. Reckon he deserves a night in a fancy bed more than a slacker like you does.”

She snorted as she stood up and gave him the finger.

“Orrrrrrr you could kiss my butt, _Jeeves_.”

“Act a little nicer and maybe I’ll let you have the sleepin’ bag when you’re layin’ out there in the cold, cold grass,” he chuckled. “No promises though.”

“Be that way. Your loss. When I save the world and I’m rich and famous and they’re making action movies about me, I’ll be sure to leave you out of the stor-- Ooh!” Something had caught her eye.

Across the room, near the base of the staircase leading upstairs, there was another fancy piece of furniture that Ellie couldn’t guess the name of. It seemed to be part table and part magazine rack and maybe part something else. A tidy stack of brochures was front and center, one standing up for display in an ornate brass holder. On the front of the brochure was a picture of the very house she was standing in.

She trotted over to it, her footsteps muffled into near-silence when her sneakers left the hardwood floor and hit the rug.

“What this heck is this thing?” she asked in amazement. “Why does this house have a magazine with a picture of this house on it? Is this place a museum or something?”

Joel ambled over to look. He made sure not to let it show in his face or body language, but sometimes her excitement and curiosity were contagious.

“‘The Tamarack House’,” she read aloud, taking her time with the strange word. “Tamarack? Somebody’s name maybe?” She turned to face the empty room, curtsied to unseen guests, using her fancy lady voice again, “How do you do, Mr. and Mrs. Tamarack? Care for a spot of tea? I’ll have Jeeves fetch some.” She clapped her hands twice again, as haughtily as she could.

“It’s a tree,” Joel said helpfully, ignoring her invisible houseguests. “Those pine trees we saw on the way into town, the ones that were turnin’ yellow and orange? Those are tamaracks.”

“Cool,” Ellie said. “I was wondering about that. I thought Christmas trees stayed green all year round.”

“Some don’t.”

“Neat.” She turned her attention back to the brochure. “‘Finest Bed & Breakfast in the Elk Mountain region’.” She looked to Joel. “Bed & Breakfast? What’s that?”

A peculiar, puzzled look crossed Joel’s face. He ran his fingers through his hair as he mulled his thoughts over.

“Hard to explain?” she asked.

**. . .**

The kitchen was separate from the dining room and there was authentic, old-fashioned pantry. Ellie had her flashlight tied to the shoulder strap of her backpack as she searched the dim space. Joel was within earshot, rummaging through the kitchen cabinets.

“So you just let total strangers sleep in your house and eat your food?” The small room lent her suspicious voice an echo. “Just because they gave you money?”

His voice carried back to her. “I sure as hell didn’t. But some folks did.”

“Man, you lived in a weird time, Joel.”

“I sure did.”

She came into the kitchen, her arms full of the things she had found.

“Ever stay at a bed & breakfast?” she asked, dumping the assortment on the oval table at the center of the room.

Standing by the sink, he turned at the waist to look at her. “What do you think?”

Delighted to have his full attention for a moment, she made a big show of putting her hands on her hips and staring at the ceiling thoughtfully. She stroked her chin for added affect. “I’m gonna guess… no?”

“Got it right on the first try,” he grunted, dropping to all fours to explore the cabinets under the sink. “Never stayed at a place like this in my life.”

“Too fancy?”

“Too fancy.”

“I would have,” she offered, holding her hands up, turning in a small circle, taking in the room, which was incredibly nice, especially for a kitchen. “I’d’ve loved to have stayed at someplace super fancy like this. Especially back before the world went to shit. Can you even imagine how nice this place must have been back then?”

“You’re stayin’ at one tonight, ain’t ya?”

“True,” she grinned. “I’ve never stayed in a place that’s been placed on the prestigious National Historic Register.”

“Me neither.”

“Gosh? Really? Wow! You can’t believe how shocked I am to hear that,” she snarked, arranging the stuff she’d found into general categories for his inspection as she continued to chatter away. “This place was over a hundred years old, even back before the outbreak. So cool. We just have to pick out which suite we want. They’ve all got some pretty awesome names, according to the brochure. Should we sleep in the Mountain Suite? Or the River Suite? Large windows. French doors. Jetted bathtubs. Satellite TV. Ritzy stuff, dude. Homey and elegant and inviting, they say.”

His head still inside the cabinet under the sink, Joel chuckled. Clearly, she had already committed the brochure to memory. Her brain never seemed to be in any danger of filling up, no matter how much oddball trivia she stuffed it with.

Ellie stood by the table, waiting for him to come over and see what she had found. “Or maybe we could try out one of the cozy little treetop retreats up on the third floor? Either of them are the perfect romantic getaway from the pressures of a hectic world, you know.”

“Is that a fact?” he replied, standing up at last, stretching his back, a plastic mixing bowl in his hands, several cans of food piled into it. “I don’t know, Ellie. Seems to me that it’d be a shame to let all these rooms go to waste, seein’ as how we got so many choices.”

“Yeah?”

“Sure,” he said, bringing the food over. “We can each have our own room. How’s that sound to you?”

“Dude!” she protested, trying to play it off as a joke but sounding more defensive than she intended. “Don’t even joke! That’s… that’s _not_ funny, you dick.”

He laughed and patted her bottom reassuringly as she tried not to pout. “We’ll take a look at ‘em and you can pick us out a room _after_ we get this stuff sorted. All right?”

“Dick,” she repeated but smiled as he pulled her close for a quick side-hug.

“You found some good stuff, girl,” he said, feeling her melt, knowing how much she craved praise and validation.

Poor thing, he thought, wondering if maybe he teased her too much – sometimes she responded well to it, other times, in moments that were thankfully rare, words meant as a safe, easy joke unexpectedly wounded her. Is it the teenage girl in her that makes her such a minefield sometimes? Or is there still too much of the little orphan hiding inside her?

“Heck yeah, I did,” she responded, poking a finger into his ribs. “Better than you did, I bet.”

**. . .**

The door opened with a soft squeak. Ellie peered in from around his side, and like always, tried to squeeze in past Joel as he entered the tiny bedroom.

“Holy shit!” she blurted, her legs carrying her across the width of the small floor in four quick steps, “Look at this thing! I’ve never seen a bed like this! Check out the bed, Joel!”

“I’m lookin’.”

The bed was built into a cozy nook that overlooked the roof of the house. There were two windows, one at the foot of the bed, and another alongside the edge, that ran up from the mattress to the low, angled roof above. The windows looked out across backyard and the large, detached two-car garage with the added little parking lot set off to the side, near the treeline with the artfully fitted creek rock pathway that led back to the house. Above the bed, a bookshelf had been set in the wall over the headboard. The sturdy ledge that held the mattress had been crafted with two drawers, probably filled with extra blankets. The heavy, embroidered quilt covering the bed looked handmade and had probably been quite expensive, though many years of exposure to the sun had faded the formerly rich colors along the top.

Ellie spun around in place and sat down with a plop. A small dust cloud exploded around her bottom, but she paid it no mind. Her face was a perfect expression of joy.

“Oh my God! Look at it! This is the cutest bed I’ve ever seen!”

“This the room you want then?”

“Are you _joking?_ I am _NEVER_ leaving this room, Joel!” she laughed.

 

* * *

 

“FUCK FUCK FUCK!!!” she hissed through clenched teeth.

“Water’s not gonna get any warmer, Ellie,” Joel said. “Just dive in and get it over with quick as you can.”

“Oh God! I don’t want to do this!” she squealed. “It’s too fucking cold!”

“We stink. We need a bath,” Joel said.

“You stink! You stink for making me do this!”

From his vantage point on the grassy shore, Joel watched the naked girl hopping and splashing around in knee-deep water. She had taken only a few, timid steps out into cold waters of the creek until she could no longer muster the will to go any further.

“Can’t be no more’n waist deep in the middle. Just grit your teeth and get out there.”

“God! This shit’s like ice! I’m not fucking kidding, Joel!”

“It’s like pullin’ off a band-aid, Ellie. Do it quick and get it over with.”

“Nope! Nope! No fucking way!” And with that, Ellie turned and splashed back to the safety of the grass. She hugged herself and stamped around, trying to get circulation restored to the blocks of ice that had formerly been her feet

“Frostbite! I’ve got frostbite!” she wheezed, stomping the weeds flat as she hopped about in a tiny, frantic circle. “I wanna smack you so bad right now! Soon as I can feel my hands, I’m coming over there and knocking the shit out of you!”

“We aint’ had a bath in a week, Ellie.”

“I don’t mind! I’m gross, so what? I’ll fucking wait till summer if it means I get to keep all my toes!”

Joel sighed heavily. He knew a lost cause when he saw one, and to be fair, that stretch of water looked clean and clear and cold as hell. The girl probably wasn’t being entirely overdramatic. “Fine. I reckon we can cut a corner or two and settle for a sponge bath.”

“Thank you, Jesus! I’m about to freeze my nuts off!” she exclaimed and dashed past him, sprinting numbly to where she’d left her clothes. Ignoring her t-shirt, she snatched up her beloved three-color windbreaker instead. With clumsy fingers, she pulled it on and zipped it all the way up. She gasped in relief, shivering more than absolutely necessary, just to make sure her bearded tormenter got the point. “Legs still cold! Feet are gone! Gonna have to amputate!”

Joel chuckled. “All right, you big crybaby. Put your clothes back on.”

“Already doing it!” she said, shoving one foot through the leg of her jeans, her underwear lying forgotten in the grass near her shoes and socks. “And if I’m the baby, then why don’t you show me how it’s done, tough guy. Drop your drawers and do a fucking swan dive, why doncha? I’ll help you look for the pieces of your frozen balls after they fall off.”

Joel laughed. “After the show you just put on? I look that dumb to you?”

“Yes!”

“Well, I was smart enough to send you in first to test it out, wasn’t I?”

“God, you’re so mean to me!” She was sitting in the grass, jeans unzipped, struggling to pull one of her shoes onto a wet, bare foot. “Fuck! Why won’t my stupid shoe work?!”

Joel took a moment to think while Ellie struggled with her shoes. An idea occurred to him, one so obvious he would have been embarrassed to admit he hadn’t thought of it sooner.

When he had Ellie’s attention again, he pointed to the treeline and the horse, where the wheelbarrow he’d found earlier was parked in the grass. It was filled with every empty jug they had been able to scrounge up. He had been planning on hauling plenty of water back to the house to do laundry in one of the bed and breakfast’s many bathtubs, but there was no reason those jugs couldn’t serve more than one purpose.

“Help me fill those jugs and we’ll head on back to the house.”

Scooping up her underwear, T-shirt, and the other items of clothing she’d had no time to put on in her haste, Ellie fell into step alongside him, her untied shoelaces dragging behind her. She pulled the hood of her windbreaker up and began hurriedly stuffing her dirty, unbound hair inside it. Once most of it was safe and warm inside, she pulled the drawstrings tight around her face. She wanted to be absolutely certain he understood the extent of the trauma he had inflicted upon her. She never put her hood up voluntarily. He couldn’t mistake the message she was sending.

“Alright, Joel. But I’ll hand the jugs to you. There’s no way I’m going anywhere near that water again.”

“Make you a deal, kiddo,” Joel offered, “while I’m getting’ dinner together, if you’ll clean out that big tub downstairs and help me haul the buckets inside, I’ll make a couple of extra fires and we can have a hot bath tonight.”

“Wow. I’m hating you a little less all of a sudden,” Ellie muttered through chattering teeth. She would have grinned except she needed to conserve what little precious body heat she still had.

 

* * *

 

“C’mon! C’mon!”

“I am.”

“Hurry up, slowpoke! The water’s gonna get cold!”

“I’m carryin’ two of these damn things. You’ve just got the one. And it’s half the size of these heavy bastards.”

“Shush! C’mon! C’mon!”

“Next trip, we’re tradin’ buckets.”

“Pfft!”

 

* * *

 

The horse nosed his muzzle against the red and black flannel shirt drying on the rope stretched between trees and gave it a curious sniff. It smelled like food… almost. But something was off. Nevertheless, he sniffed it again. It smelled somewhat like apples, but clothes weren’t apples. He snorted in disappointment. Only apples should smell like apples. Anything else was just playing a trick.

“You don’t need that,” the man said, sitting by one of the several small fires going in the backyard. “Go on now.”

The horse understood the tone though he didn’t understand the words. He didn’t understand the need for so many fires this evening either. Usually one fire was enough for the people he was traveling with. Fire was spooky. Why did they need so many today? The autumn air was only a little cool and fire was unsettling under the best of circumstances. It didn’t matter. People did strange things sometimes, but on a nice day like this, when his saddle and bridle were off and he could run around in a safe, fenced in-space with lots of grass and more than enough room to stay far away from the fires, why worry? He flicked his tail dismissively and meandered away, giving another fluttery snort for good measure. Surely there had to be things that smelled like apples that were actually apples somewhere in this big back yard.

Joel watched the animal as it explored the backyard, nosing, sniffing, strangely ignoring the grass, and seemingly looking for something. Joel wondered what sort of thoughts were rattling around inside the animal’s head. He chuckled at the futility of it, and leaned back against the trunk of the maple tree. The oilcloth was in his right hand, the slide of Ellie’s pistol in the other. The other parts of the Beretta were spread out on a ratty towel, frayed at the edges, not fit for anything but a rag anymore. It was the towel he’d had in his backpack on that hot, late summer day when he and Tess had set out to square things with Robert.

Joel sighed, feeling very old.

“You’re cleaning my gun?”

Ellie’s voice snapped him out of his reverie. The horse loped past him, making a beeline for the girl who always treated him nicely.

The animal’s favorite person stood in the doorway, wearing only a large, fluffy towel. Her hair was still wet, and framed her face like curtains of clean red silk.

“Had to,” Joel shrugged, teasing. “It was even dirtier than you were.”

“True. But I’m squeaky clean now. And I smell like green apples.” She stepped out onto the large wooden deck attached to the back of the house. The afternoon sun warmed her pleasantly. “I never took a bath with scented dishwashing liquid before. Kinda nice.”

“Lucky we scrounged up a bottle that was still soft enough to use. Bar soap is better. It lasts longer. The soft stuff usually turns into a hard brick eventually.”

“I really like it.”

“Yeah. Not as good as the soap we got from the Motel 6. But it’ll do in a pinch.”

She held up her arm and sniffed it. “Mmm. It’s almost like perfume. They had perfume that smelled like green apples, right?”

“Probably. They bottled just about every smell in the world, it seems.”

Looking up at her, the horse nickered happily if a bit impatiently, wanting her to come down to him. Horses were opposed to stairs on general principle.

On bare feet, she stepped lightly across the warm wood of the deck and carefully made her way down the steps to the waiting horse.

“Watch out for splinters,” Joel said.

“I am.”

Holding her towel in place, Ellie reached out to pet the horse. His ears were floppy and his tail was held high. Ellie was pretty sure that meant he was happy, but learning the unspoken language of horses was taking her some time, even with tips from Joel. The animal leaned his thick neck forward to accept her hand.

“Hey there. Miss me?” the girl cooed, stroking and scratching, delighting the animal. She turned her head to look at Joel. “You know, sooner or later we’re gonna have to give him a name.”

“He’s already got a name.” Joel returned the recoil spring to the frame of her pistol with his thumb, checking carefully to make sure it was seated properly.

“Yeah, but you forgot to ask Tommy what it was.”

“We’ll ask him when we get back.” They had had this conversation before. He eased the barrel back into the slide and reattached it to the frame of the gun.

“Ugh. That’ll take _forever_ ,” she protested. “Seriously, Joel. The poor guy needs a name _now_.”

Joel shrugged and Ellie took it as permission.

“Let me seeeeee,” she began, making a big show of thinking. “He’s sweet… big… kind of dumb in a cute way… I’m thinking maybe I should call him Joel.”

Joel grunted. Ellie giggled. The horse brushed her towel with his nose, sniffing.

“I think Joel II smells the soap on me. I bet I smell like an apple to him.”

“We are _not_ callin’ him Joel II,” Joel groused.

“We could call him Joel Too. Tee-oh-oh. It’s a pun? Get it?”

“We ain’t callin’ him that neither.” Joel was already going about the business of disassembling the Colt semiautomatic. “Just pick out something that suits him,” he said, pretending not to see the way the girl grinned in victory. “And not anything silly,” he cautioned.

“Cool,” she said, giving her four-legged friend an extra vigorous scratch behind the ear. “I’m gonna pick out the greatest name a horse ever had, buddy. You just wait and see.”

The horse flicked his tail appreciatively. Her words were meaningless to him, but he knew praise when he heard it.

“Kinda surprised you didn’t have one ready to go.”

“Actually, I’ve thought up about a dozen that I really like. Now I just need to decide which one is the absolute best.”

Joel chuckled. “Figures. Look, just keep it simple. That’s all I ask.”

“Will do.” She walked to Joel, the horse staying close to her until she got near the fire. “Ready for your bath?”

“Just about. Let me finish cleanin’ this last gun.”

Ellie looked around at the empty buckets in the grass and the assortment of pots and pans simmering on the scavenged oven racks arranged across the little fires. “Do you think the water has had enough time to get hot?”

“Plenty. You were in there for a few days, I think.”

“Was not,” she said, then, after a moment, “Was I in there a long time? Really?”

“Enough time for me to put up a clothes line, get the saddle off the horse, and clean all the guns,” he chuckled.

“Wow,” Ellie murmured, surprised. “Didn’t seem that long.” She shrugged her narrow shoulders. “Ah, well. What are you gonna do? That’s the first hot bath I’ve had since… well… um… You know what? I think that’s the first hot bath I’ve _ever_ had in my whole life.”

“That’s a sad, sad story. I reckon it’ll do as an excuse for you gettin’ out of your chores.”

She poked at him with a toe. He lightly nudged it away with his elbow.

“Pfft. _Whatever_. A girl loses track of time when she’s in bathtub heaven, dude.”

Holding the towel snug around her, she sat down next to him.

“You could have joined me,” she offered in her best sexy voice, leaning in. “I hear that’s a romantic thing couples do. This place is supposed to be a romantic getaway, right? Don’t make me go get the brochure.”

Joel chuckled quietly again. He thought about needling her over her use of the word ‘couples’ but thought better of it. Ellie was in too good of mood to risk spoiling it. He idly made note of the fact that she had shaved her legs.

“Too much to do before bedtime for both of us to be goldbrickin’ it,” he replied. “Laundry needin’ hangin’ up. Guns needed cleanin’. Horse was pretty sick of being tacked up all day. Somebody had to do all that. One of us had to pick up the slack so the other could soak in a tub until she was all pink and pruney.”

“I’m pruney?” She held out her hand, looked at her wrinkled fingertips. “Oh, hey! I am, huh?”

“To be honest, I thought about makin’ you do the chores, but I figured, hey, I’ve never shaved my legs in my life, why start now, yeah?”

Ellie giggled, bringing a smile to Joel’s face as he finished field stripping the gun. She leaned against him and exhaled happily. “Thank you.”

“Welcome.”

“You stink.”

“Yes, I do.”

 

* * *

 

Ellie made sure she had the privilege of pouring the last bucket of steaming water into the tub.

“Voila! Bath time is served.”

“Jesus, do I need this,” he grunted, unbuttoning his flannel shirt. He tossed it into the blue milk crate by the door; their ad hoc laundry basket. The last of Ellie’s soiled clothes were in there too, waiting to be washed tomorrow. He tugged off his t-shirt and it landed, wadded up, on top of the pile.

Ellie stood in the open doorway, the black plastic pail in hand, watching quietly, taking in all the details.

Joel paused as he unfastened his belt buckle. He fixed her with his dark eyes. Ellie looked away quickly, blushing, caught.

“If you’re stayin’,” Joel said casually, “close the door. Don’t let all the heat out.”

Ellie placed one foot in the hallway, a token effort at being a diligent sidekick. “You sure I shouldn’t, you know… go do chores or something? Fold the horse? Feed the laundry?”

She grinned mischievously, cheeks red, emerald eyes hooded and playful.

He chuckled. “Do whatever you like, girl.”

She closed the door.

**. . .**

Joel groaned. The sound stirred the deepest, most feminine parts of Ellie. From where she sat on the bathroom countertop, she shifted her hips discretely. Joel leaned back, stretching out, legs open. The water made the black hair on his body seem darker, thicker, more masculine. It swayed in the currents he created when he moved his arms or legs, swaying, hypnotizing the girl.

_You are one beautiful man, Joel._

_No, wait. You’re not supposed to call men beautiful for some reason._

Ellie smiled to herself. Problem solved.

_You are one manly man, Joel._

He reached over and shook the squeeze bottle of green dish soap vigorously, his thumb over the spout hole. Earlier, he’d added a cup of hot water to the semi-solid blob at the bottom the bottle, giving it time to soften and mix, magically becoming soap again. She’d tried to use no more than half of it, leaving plenty for him. He squirted a hefty dollop onto a washcloth and began to lather up.

His wet skin, now soapy, began to glisten, catching the light streaming in from the leaded glass window over the tub. Rivulets of suds ran down his body, tracing the contours of his muscles, pooling into a white ring that floated around his waist.

Ellie had to say something. Talking was her way, especially when she was nervous.

“You’re not mad I kinda sorta left you hanging? With the chores, I mean.”

“Ehh. Figured you deserved a treat. But don’t you start thinkin’ I’m gonna be doin’ your half of the chores all the time now.”

Joel began to scrub his face resolutely. He worked the cloth behind his ears, around the back of his neck. Ellie never took her eyes of him.

“Man, if we could ever find some batteries for my Walkman, we’d have some music.”

“If that’s what you call it,” he said from behind the washcloth. “Personally, I was hopin’ you’d forget and leave that tape of yours in the El Camino.”

“Ha! You couldn’t get that lucky, buddy. I’m going to teach you to appreciate good music, no matter how long it takes.”

He barked a short laugh and squirted more soap onto the cloth before working his chest hair into a good lather.

“Chest hair is the best hair,” Ellie cooed in a low, singsong voice.

“What?” Joel asked.

Ellie pulled in a quick breath.

_Shit! Did I say that out loud?_

“Hang on!” she blurted, dropping down from the counter. She was through the door in a flash. “Stay there! I forgot something!”

Joel grimaced. She’d left the door open and a cool breeze began to blow in on him.

**. . .**

Ellie cleared her throat ceremoniously, getting ready.

“I can’t believe this,” Joel grumbled. “After I did all those chores for you.”

“Hush,” Ellie sniffed. “This is good for you.”

“Not so sure about that,” he muttered.

“Did you hear about the guy who got run over by a lawn mower and had his whole left side cut off?”

Joel scrubbed the grime from his legs.

“He’s all right now,” she continued, grinning.

“Ugh.”

“I used to be a banker,” she said. “But I lost interest.”

Joel said nothing.

“I don’t get it,” she admitted. “No biggie. Here’s the next one: I don’t trust stairs… They’re always up to something.” She laughed and checked Joel’s reaction. “Get it?”

“I get it.”

“One of these will make you laugh, you’ll see.” She turned the page. “A soldier who has survived pepper spray and mustard gas is a _seasoned_ veteran.”

Joel chuckled.

“Boosh! Ellie scores!” She raised her arms and wiggled her hips, dancing in triumph, managing to catch the towel as it came loose, barely keeping her breasts covered. “Whew! Close one! You almost saw me naked.” She turned around and shook her bare ass at him for good measure. “ _Butt_ you didn’t! That’s another pun! I win! You lose!”

“Ah, I’ve already seen that little butt. You won’t stop showin’ it to me,” Joel said airily. “Hell, I can’t get you to keep your clothes on no matter how hard I try.”

She gaped, eyes wide, spun around, a shocked, sharp exhalation coming from her open mouth. She kicked at him playfully. “Hey! I shaved my legs for you, you butt head!”

Joel barked a curt laugh and reached for her towel, soapy water flying from his outstretched arm. “Take that thing off, girl. Let’s see what else you shaved.”

She shrieked, wanting to be mad at him, hating it when he turned things around on her like that, outsmarting her, and worse yet, outsnarking her. “No! You don’t get to see me naked anymore, ass!”

“I just saw that ass!” he crowed. “Show me the rest!”

He lunged, his body rising halfway out of the tub. Water flew as a wave of suds splashed out. She squealed and cackled and darted away towards the safety of the closed door, just out of his reach. “No! Ahh! I’m not the kind of girl!”

“But you want to be! Don’cha, darlin’?” His lusty, echoing laughter filled the small room, mixing with the splashing water and her delighted peals of joy as she kept a safe distance.

“I’ll never tell!” And with an ecstatic whoop, she threw open the door and ran from the room.

He settled back into the warm tub, smiling, the waves he had created crashing back and forth across him.

A moment later, she returned and threw her towel at his head.

He bolted from the tub, water erupting everywhere, and chased the naked girl down the hallway, his cock hard and swinging wildly from side to side as he dashed after her, his feet slipping and sliding on the polished oak floor.

Laughing and hollering, Ellie burst through the back door and scampered down the steps, Joel in hot pursuit. He ignored the stairs, leaping down to the grass just as the girl darted behind the big maple tree. The horse, who had been taking in the sights over by the gated fence, pranced and whinnied at the unexpected sights and sounds. He hoped this was a game they were playing. Horses liked to play.

“Hide and seek!” Ellie called out from behind the tree. “Go inside! Count to ten!”

“Sure you wouldn’t rather play ‘tag’?” Joel laughed, his big feet swishing through the tall grass as he strode towards the tree, naked and confident, erect and unconcerned.

Ellie peered around the side of the trunk, grinning nervously. This wasn’t a game she had played before and her body trembled with a heady mixture of anticipation and trepidation. Her heart was racing. She had always liked being chased, even as a little girl. But being chased while naked felt somehow primal and thrilling. The image of a cavewoman being pursued by a determined caveman through the tall grasses of the primeval world flickered across the projection screen she kept in her mind. The caveman wanted to catch the woman, and she wanted to be caught, but the chase was the spice that made the meal better, to steal a phrase she had heard Sister Abigail use in the kitchen. Breathless, Ellie realized she wanted to be caught too.

_Why else would I have run like I did? I was hoping he’d do something like this._

She grinned, holding on to the tree for support, the bark prickling her belly and breasts delightfully.

_Oh man, this is like a dirty movie, the ones Riley told me about. But I’m the star._

“How do we know which one of us is ‘it’?” she teased, her lilting voice shaking in a way that made Joel’s balls feel heavier.

“Come on out here, girl,” he said, smiling wickedly, in no mood for children’s games. His blood was running hot and he didn’t feel the cool breeze at all. His cock throbbed, seeing her, wanting her. It whispered to him what to tell the girl and he said the words it provided. “Let me see that sexy little butt of yours.”

_This is just like the movies Riley told me about!_

“Okay. Hang on.” Ellie ducked behind the tree again, out of sight. Joel heard her take a quick, encouraging breath to build up her nerve, followed by another for good measure. The bark of the tree was rough against her bare ass. She swallowed hard and nodded once to herself.

_Here I go._

“Here I come.”

She stepped out of cover and stood as boldly as she dared in the shade of the tree. His eyes took her in. She blushed, head to toe. She wanted to cover herself. She almost did, but caught herself and made her hands stay at her side.

_He’s seen you naked before. Be cool, Boo. Be cool._

“Take a picture,” she said, remembering something the girls at the dorm used to say whenever they caught one of the boys looking at them during P.E., “it’ll last longer.”

“If I had a camera,” Joel replied in a low, husky tone that sent Ellie’s blood surging through her veins, “I sure as hell would.”

“W-would you show it to Tommy?” Ellie teased, proud that she had been quick enough to counter him, proud that her voice was almost steady, proud that she was still winning this game.

“I’d charge him a dollar,” Joel winked, beckoning her over with one hand.

_He winked at me! Has he ever done that before?_

“Just one? I’m hurt,” Ellie snarked, voice firm but high, and too nervous in her ears. Her heart was racing. She placed her hands on her hips, cocking them to one side, her thighs open, the plump, soft lips of her pussy peeking out at him from behind her auburn curls.

_Fuck, I should have shaved my pussy. Why did I chicken out? I shaved everything else!_

She looked over at the horse as though she were slightly above it all, but secretly needing moral support from her four-legged buddy. “I’d charge him ten dollars. Maybe twenty.”

_Riley shaved hers for that dumbass Montego. I teased her about it, but maybe I was just jealous she had someone who wanted her to do that? I can’t tell anymore._

She glanced at him quickly before looking away again.

_Oh man! It’s pointing right at me._

“C’mere, girl,” Joel said in that same, low fashion.

_Can’t… resist… sexy voice…_

Ellie looked at him, at his dick, at his wet chest, at him, at his glistening biceps, at his dick, at him, at the dark hair plastered to his flat stomach, at the droplets of bath water dripping from his balls, at his dick, at him, at his chest, at his dick, at his big dick, at his big hard dick.

_Fuck, I can’t think. I’m too horny. Help me, Bad Ellie! What do I do?_

_Go over there and grab that thing! Show him you’re not a scared little chicken._

Ellie began to walk towards him, not entirely sure her feet were actually touching the ground.

_Grab it! Grab that thing, Boo! He won’t be expecting it! Not from Good Girl Ellie! Grab it! DO IT!_

_I will! I’m not there yet, Bad Ellie! Give me a damn minute!_

The evening sun was already drying him. He reached out for her hands as she drew near, and she let him take them. They were shaking. She couldn’t hide it. She took one more step, until there was just enough room between them for his erection.

_Just a little closer and it’d be touching my stomach._

He lifted her hands and placed them on his shoulders. She slid them closer to his thick neck while he eased his rough, calloused palms onto her hips.

She looked up at him. She felt like her whole body was shaking. Her mouth was dry. She licked her lips and gave him her best sexy smile.

“So… uh… which one of us it ‘it’ now? And where’s home base?”

He laughed and lowered his head, pulling her in for a kiss. She levered herself up onto her tiptoes and brought her lips to his.

_It’s touching my stomach! Pressed right against it! Fuck, it feels huge!_

_Not a grab, Good Ellie. But any contact is good enough. Points to you, Boo._

Their lips still pressed together and with one arm around her waist, Joel reached down with the other and cupped her ass.

_That counts too._

 

* * *

 

The horse was safe in the garage for the night. Ellie had said her goodnights to him. If it bothered him being alone out in the building, the animal gave no indication. Besides, he was sharing space with a Jaguar, which Joel said was a very fancy car and too damn bad all four tires were flat.

The denim of her jeans was stiff, having dried in the sun. She scratched her leg idly and returned to folding the clean laundry on the dining room table.

“If I catch a cold from all that rolling around in the grass, I’m blaming you.”

Joel was in the kitchen. She could see him through the open door that connected the rooms. He was chopping vegetables.

“What’s that you say? You want me to put you to bed without dinner? Well, if that’s what you want, alright then. Suit yourself.”

“I’m gonna be picking grass out of my buttcrack for days,” she snickered.

“I had to keep you where I wanted you. If I’d let you have your way, we wouldn’t’ve stopped in time.”

Ellie groaned. “Tell me about it! It’s like you get me all worked up and then won’t do any of the really good stuff just cause you like to be mean to me.”

“You’re too damn young,” he replied, his tone friendly but a little too parental for her taste.

“I am _not_.”

“Yes, you are.” Joel stepped into the dining room, carrying a cereal bowl of chopped green onions. The foil packets he had cooked over the campfire were on the dining room table, still folded over, sealed, steam trickling out from the tented edges.

“I’m _fourteen_ ,” she insisted.

“You’re fourteen,” he replied flatly.

“Ugh.” Nothing more to be said.

The bowl of freshly picked, still mostly ripe onions rattled on the table as he sat it down. Deftly, he unwrapped the foil bundles and the aoma of seasoned meat and vegetables wafted out with the billowing steam.

“Man, that smells good!” she said, inhaling deeply. “I am starving. Probably my poor body fighting off the early stages of pneumonia, no doubt.”

“Probably,” he said, forking the contents out onto expensive porcelain dinner plates. He pushed a plate of food across to her. “I’m countin’ my lucky stars you didn’t take off down the river on another one of your buck naked adventures.”

“High point of my trip so far,” she giggled. Ellie got up, trotted around to his side of the table to sit next to him. She reached over the table, grunting, straining to reach the plate she had forgotten to take with her. “Unnf! Stupid table! Who needs a table this big?”

“Need a stepladder?” Joel laughed lightly and sat down as she pulled the plate towards her by her fingertips.

“Tah dah! See? Just tall enough!” She sat down too and scooted her chair closer to his before taking her first bite. She paused, her mouth filled with food, a rapturous look spread across her face. “Hohehh shehh, Joeh! Theh eh ahmahheee!!”

“Try that one more time?” he said, smiling, pleased.

She chewed, grinned, chewed while grinning, swallowed.

“I said ‘Holy shit, Joel. This is amazing.’ What is this?”

“That bird I shot this mornin’, plus the cans of carrots and potatoes we found –“

“ _I_ found the carrots,” she interjected. Whatever this delicious concoction was, she didn’t want her contribution to go unremarked. “Let the record show that.”

“- plus some of those dried garlic bits you found in the pantry,” Joel continued without missing a beat, “and that can of mushroom soup we found a while back.”

“Fuhh theh eh gooh!” Chewing again. “Fuck this is good!” she repeated after swallowing.

“Jello for dessert,” he reminded her, though it seemed unlikely to him that she could have possibly forgotten about it. He’d spent the last two hours shooing her away from the bowl where it was slowly thickening. Dessert didn’t need any Ellie-sized finger holes in it. “Leave a little room for some.”

She swallowed again, another heaping forkful poised at the edge of her mouth.

“You think it will still be good? It was a brick when you opened the box.”

“I smashed it back into powder. The boiling water did the rest. I took a look at it before I came in here. It’s looks like Jello to me.”

“Great! Seriously, Joel, this is the best meal I’ve had in ages.”

“Me too.” He sprinkled some of the onions onto his plate. Ellie, no fan of onions, put on a horrified face and made a small cross with her fingers, warding them away. Joel snorted a short laugh. “Onions are good for you, squirt.”

“Nah. It’s my carrots that really bring it all together,” she grinned, before filling her mouth to capacity again.

Joel gave her upper back a quick, affectionate rub and finally took his first bite of dinner. Ellie was already halfway through hers, racing to the finish like always.

**. . .**

“That was pretty damn good,” Joel said, leaning back from the table, watching Ellie swipe her finger around his bowl, catching the last bits of red Jello. “You gonna lick that bowl clean?”

“Shut up. I might,” she chirped, popping the finger in her mouth. “Mmm!”

“I’ll get this mess cleaned up. You wanna get that laundry packed away? Never know. We might have to leave in a hurry.”

“Sure,” Ellie said. She knew Joel’s ‘rules of the road’ by heart now.

 _Number one: Luck runs out sooner or later. Don’t push your luck if you don’t have to._  
_Number two: Be ready to go at a moment’s notice._  
_Number three: Bullets are scarce. Make every shot count._  
_Number four: Beards are super sexy. Grow one if you can._

Ellie snickered.

_Okay, I added that one. But it deserves to be on the list._

“What’s funny?” Joel asked, on the verge of yawning.

“Hmm? Oh. Umm, I was thinking I should give your beard a trim tomorrow.”

“Alright,” Joel said, scratching his stomach. The flannel was still stiff from its time on the clothesline. “Maybe I’ll give yours a little trim too.”

“Pssht! Girls don’t have a beards, dummy,” Ellie snickered. She ran her fingers over her chin thoughtfully, striking her most academic pose. “Kinda wish I did though. I’d grow a one of those… whaddya call ‘em… goatees? Think it would make me look smart? Smarter than I already am, I mean. Maybe I could smoke a pipe too?”

Joel patted her thigh. “Never heard of the bearded clam?”

Ellie pulled her lips into her mouth, suddenly shy, blushing. She crossed her ankles under the table, extended her legs, swung them back and forth like a pendulum, looked at the empty plates on the table, the pictures on the wall, the soft evening light coming in through the big window. Grinning, she couldn’t make eye contact with him.

“Umm…” she began, biting her bottom lip, tugging her fingers, playing along, “I don’t think National Geographic ever covered those.”

Joel chuckled. He was laughing more since they’d decided to stick together at Jackson. Ellie liked the new Joel.

_He’s more relaxed. A little bit, anyway. He’s fun. Not as grumpy as he used to be._

_I remember him being sort of like this with Tess a few times. Maybe he was like this a lot when it was just him and her?_

_Her and him? She and he? Fuck, grammar is hard sometimes._

She smiled in relief, finally letting herself believe something that she had been holding on to for a long time.

_I think me and Joel really are a team now._

_Joel and me. No, Joel and I… Yep. I think that’s right._

“You made the smart move by keeping me around, Joel.” She nodded smugly.

“That’s the truth.” Joel stretched, yawned. He stood up. “Get that laundry packed up, yeah? I’ll tend to this mess.”

“‘Kay.”

_Another warm, fuzzy moment over just like that. Not a very sappy man, my Joel._

She hopped up, walked around the table, practically skipping, happy and weightless. She began to roll up their clothes as tightly as she could so that they would occupy as little space as possible in their packs. One by one, she stuffed the garments into crinkled old plastic shopping bags and wrapped them up snug, double bagging each bundle. It paid to put in the extra work necessary to keep your clothes dry, especially if the weather turned nasty.

_I think that’s rule number twelve. Always have dry clothes handy. Rain is only romantic if you’re not out in it._

She held up the brown flannel shirt he had bought at the public market in Burlington, the cool, fortified bridge town they had passed through when they had crossed the Mississippi on the rolling wheels of the big, red Honda.

_Burlington’s got electricity, just like Jackson. And neither one of them is a QZ. They’re free places, just like how all towns used to be._

_See? It’s not all shitty out here._

_There’s still plenty of world for me to save. It’s gonna be okay. I’m sure of it._

She held his shirt up for him to see. “I’m gonna sleep in this tonight, okay?”

Joel, on his way to the kitchen, his hands filled with dishes, stopped. He looked over his shoulder at her, eyes twinkling devilishly. “If you want, sure. But I got a feelin’ you ain’t gonna be wearin’ it very long.”

Ellie grinned, practically every tooth on display. Her cheeks reddened. Her stomach did a quick somersault. Her toes curled inside her socks.

She watched him go. She watched his ass most of all. She wanted to bounce up and down.

Once he was safely out of sight, she did. Quietly.

**. . .**

“Going outside to check on the horse,” Ellie shouted from the backdoor.

“Put on a coat,” Joel answered from the living room, where he was busy taking an inventory of their ammunition and supplies.

“Thanks, Grandma! I will!”

She didn’t take a coat.

Evening dew was beginning to collect on the grass. It soaked through her socks. Her shoes were drying just inside the back door. She knelt down, tugged off her socks, and ran through the grass on wet feet. It was cooling off fast as the sun sank behind the mountains.

The horse turned to see who was coming in through the side door of the garage. There were several small rectangular windows set in both of the big, roll-up doors. He had been looking out through them, watching the world go by, missing the sky overhead, not very fond of being enclosed by four walls and a roof. This place smelled strange, like chemicals and rust. The ground was hard under his hooves. He missed the grass. He was safe in here, he sensed that, but a horse belonged under the stars and preferably mixed in with a big herd. Safety in numbers. Safety was lots of places to run if you needed to. He didn’t like being alone out here. He didn’t like being indoors. He was glad to see the girl come in. She padded over to him, carefully stepping around a pile of fresh dung, her feet slapping on the cold concrete.

“Hey, boy. How you doing?”

He didn’t know her words, but her tone was soothing as always. She was still his friend. He hoped she would spend the night in here with him, that way they could keep an eye on each other. He ambled towards to her, horseshoes clopping on concrete, meeting her halfway. She smelled of food, carrots and onions, but also of meat, which wasn’t food. She was a predator, but a nice one.

The girl raised her hand to his muzzle. In her open palm was a small white cube. He gave it a quizzical sniff. It smelled sweet.

“Found some sugar cubes in the pantry today,” she whispered conspiratorially, rubbing the back of his neck with her free, treatless hand. “A little jar of them. I didn’t tell Joel. These are just for you. Don’t tell anyone, okay?”

The horse munched the delicious treat and kept her secret.

 

* * *

 

Ziploc bag containing his toothbrush and bedtime kit in his hand, Joel sucked the baking soda taste from his teeth, rounded the landing, and walked up the last flight of stairs.

“‘Course she would pick out a room on the third floor,” he muttered. Young people had no appreciation for their overabundance of cartilage.

The Meadowlark Retreat, he reminded himself. That’s what she says the room is called. Fancy, that’s for sure. But not as nice as that executive sweet me and Lexi stayed in when the crew was passing through Oklahoma City on our way to Arkansas. Those cold winter winds were rolling in from the north and we’d put Texas behind us for good. It was time to celebrate. Goddamn, that’s still the best Christmas party I’ve ever seen. Hotel all fenced in and stocked up for a FEMA team that never arrived. More supplies than we could have loaded into ten times as many trucks as we had. Lexi and Nicki dancing on the tables. Lisa too. God, she was so drunk. We all were. Phil may have turned out to be a sick bastard in the end, but godalmighty that man was magic behind a bar.”

Joel stopped short, halfway up the staircase.

“I ain’t Phil,” he muttered.

That girl we caught him with couldn’t’ve been no more than eight or nine. Ellie’s older than that. Maybe not as old as she ought to be, sure. But old enough for what we’re doin’, anyway.

Besides, he reminded himself, I shot that four-eyed sonofabitch… No… wait. I didn’t shoot him. Vic did. Left him dying with his balls shot off right there on the side of the road in… Georgia, I think it was? That’s right. Georgia. On our way outta the south. The Cordyceps was spreading like wildfire down there. We were trying to get away from it. And we did, mostly, for all the good that did us. Yeah, it was Vic that killed Phil. It was Landeros that I shot in Oklahoma. Right after the Christmas party. Right there in that empty street, nothing but him and me and the howls of the infected trapped inside that Whataburger, banging on the glass, trying to get at us. He had the keys to the truck. He wasn’t gonna give them back neither. He was finally making his move. I always knew it would come to that, but the way it finally did, it was like something out of a western. When it didn’t go the way he’d planned, I finally found out he spoke English too. Enough to beg for his life. Didn’t expect that from him, truth be told. Killed him when I probably should’ve shot that glass out and left him for the runners. Killed him then lied to Tommy about the whole thing. Told him it was bandits or some shit like that, I think. Baby brother never understood that sometimes you had to do shit like that when you were the boss. Same goddamn reason I would’ve killed Freddy… if the ladies hadn’t beaten me to it. Don’t matter if they were one of your own just a minute before, if you don’t have order in a group, there’s no way you’re going to keep everyone alive. I understood that. Tess sure as fuck understood it too.

Wonder if Tommy understands it now that he’s got his own town to run?

Joel sighed. “Maybe. Maybe not. Guess I’ll find out soon enough. It’s his town, not mine. I don’t want another one. That kind of shit’s not my problem anymore.”

What’s he gonna think about Ellie and me when we come ridin’ back into town all cozied up like we are now?

Gripping the wooden safety rail with white knuckles, Joel turned his neck this way and that, until it cracked satisfyingly.

Cross that bridge when I come to it, I reckon.

Knowing he was already about as damned as one man could ever get, he climbed the few remaining stairs and turned the knob of the bedroom door.

Locked.

“Don’t come in yet!” A muffled, startled voice from the other side of the door.

“Ellie…” He spoke wearily. The house was all locked up, a big piece of furniture dragged in front of the door he had shivved earlier in the day. Their guns and gear were packed and ready, waiting inside the little bedroom, just in case. The daylight was almost gone. In a world without electricity, you went to bed with the sun.

“Just a second!” Muffled, excited, hurried.

He waited. Silently counted to ten. Reminded himself that he was dealing with a teenage girl. Waited. Counted to ten again.

With a rattle, she unlocked the door and opened it for him. She stood to the side, her hand on the knob, making room for him, her other arm swinging out in a welcoming, sweeping gesture.

“Welcome to The Meadowlark Retreat, sir. As you can see, it is extremely fucking ritzy.” She bowed theatrically. “Please enjoy your stay.”

He tried to keep the laughter inside. He mostly succeeded. Ellie was weird, sure, but she was adorable in her weirdness.

Wearing nothing but his shirt, which threatened to swallow her whole, she was very appealing too. The sleeves had been pushed up, but they kept slipping down, leaving only the tips of her fingers showing. Her legs emerged from the draping hem, long and smooth, shapely, her small feet bare. Her hair was down, loose, parted on the side, showcasing her lovely face. For some reason, her bust seemed a little larger than usual. A trick of the orange-red light filtering in through the pair of windows that framed the nook bed? Or maybe the baggy shirt was hanging off her shoulders in just the right way? Joel didn’t know. He didn’t care. The effect, however it was achieved, was very flattering on her.

“Damn, you’re lookin’ pretty fine there, Ellie.”

She beamed, overjoyed. “Yeah? Thanks. Lookin’ pretty good yourself, Mr. Miller.” She gave him an exaggerated wink and spoke slyly, her eyebrows waggling. “Say… Are those new sweatpants? Or just clean ones?”

He laughed, took the doorknob from her, closing it, locking them in, safe and sound. He turned, wanting to scoop her up in his arms, but she was already darting across the tiny room, suddenly airborne, legs pulled up, arms out like wings, sailing through the air towards the bed, which they had piled with quilts and blankets taken from the other rooms.

“I call window seat!” she whooped, landing with a floomp.

She pivoted in place on her knees, twisted around to face him, knelt atop the blankets, the shirt parting to reveal more of her upper thighs. Her green eyes shimmered in pure adoration as she watched him give the room a quick check. She had expected him too. Joel was reliable. She could always trust him with stuff like this. She watched him as he silently ran a checklist in his mind. Shotgun and rifle in the corner. Backpacks close to the door. Solar-powered camp light on the window ledge, fully charged. Pistols, his and hers, on the headboard. Two tripod-legged, portable charcoal grillers lugged from nearby backyards and dragged up what had seemed like a zillion fucking stairs, each one carefully positioned away from anything flammable, and then filled with plenty of hot rocks taken from their campfires. The room was already nice and toasty.

Joel nodded, satisfied.

“Everything’s right where it should be, boss,” Ellie said with audible pride. “I do quality work.”

“Yeah. You sure do.”

She smiled. Her heart was racing. They hadn’t been alone like this, safe and indoors and ready to fool around, for a week. The last time had been at the hunter’s shack. They had done so many great things in that cute little shack. Spankings. Handjobs. Lots of fingering. Somebody sprayed his dick all over somebody else’s tits. Somebody played with her pussy while somebody else watched. And kissing. So much fun awesome cool kissing. All the details were burned into her brain and she revisited the memories often. She realized she was chewing on her bottom lip. And how long had she been breathing through a throat this tight? And why was she clutching the sheet with a death grip?

_It’s not like I haven’t seen him naked before. Stop being a fraidy cat, Ellie. Be cool. Riley would be cool if she were here. You have to be cool too._

“Care to join me?” she asked, greatly pleased by how remarkably casual she sounded.

“Best idea I’ve heard all day,” he said, his voice low, and began to peel off his shirt.

Grinning wildly, she squeaked. She couldn’t help herself.

“Hey! Wait! I can do that!” she heard herself say, right before she felt herself scrambling across the bed. She was no longer in control of herself. Her secret evil twin Bad Ellie had taken over. She was powerless to stop her. Suddenly the cotton of his T-shirt was in her hands and she was tugging it free of his arms. His sweatpants were next. On her knees, she pulled them down, tried not to notice the shape at the front of his underwear, the tighty-whiteys he had found at the shack, the same shack where he had turned her over his knee and spanked her, the same shack where he had taken all her clothes and made her run around naked all day like she was sexy and something too look at, and he was stepping out of the pants and they were flying from her outstretched hand as she tossed them across the room and he was saying ‘slow down, Ellie’ but it was hard to pay attention to words sometimes and –

He pulled her to her feet, his big hands strong and rough, one under each of her arms. She closed her eyes and let a long, happy breath out. It felt like he was going to lift her to the moon, he did it so effortlessly. The sensation of the old rug under her feet rather than whatever it was the lunar surface felt like was a bit of letdown once she opened her eyes again.

“Slow down, Ellie,” he said again. Not mad. Smiling. Tender.

She smiled. He could be gentle when he needed to be, and she loved him for that.

“Here. Let me get this,” he said, reaching out for the buttons of his borrowed shirt.

She stood stock still, letting him undo the topmost button with his big fingers, watching his hands work, fascinated by them.

“You’ve still got your underwear on,” she whispered, not sure if she meant to speak louder, not sure if she even could.

“And they’re gonna stay on,” Joel said, hushing her when a sound of protest began to rise in her throat, his fingers working on the second button. “Safer than way.”

“I’ll do the rest!” Hands covering the buttons, she spoke suddenly, stepping back from him. “Get in bed, okay?”

His dark eyes took a careful measure of her face. She wasn’t scared. And she didn’t want to stop. She clearly had something else in mind.

“Alright,” he nodded, and turned slowly, in no hurry, before crossing the room and sliding under the covers. He folded back the top few layers – it was warm still, they wouldn’t need them until later in the night, after the campfire rocks had grown cold. He lay there on his side, watching her.

“I had a friend,” Ellie began, her words coming out just a little too fast, shifting her weight from foot to foot, “back in the military school. Her name was Cheryl Jackson, but everyone called her Cherry, because of her red hair.”

“Seem to recall you mentionin’ her a time or two.” All of him was under the blankets except for his head, his shoulders, and one magnificent arm. His bicep swelled as he curled that arm to prop his head up. Ellie had to pry her eyes away from it.

_I did? When? I can’t remember! Fake it!  
_

“Yeah. I guess I did. And, um, see… she knew all about boys. I mean guys. Men.” Ellie nodded, hoping she was making sense. Joel nodded his chin once, following along, letting her know that the words coming out of her mouth weren’t just a spew of babbling nonsense like she secretly dreaded was happening. “And she told me that boys, um, guys, they, um, they really like it when a girl lets him watch while she gets undressed. Men like that sort of stuff, she said. Looking at girls. Naked girls. That’s what she told me, anyway.”

“Cherry sounds like a smart girl,” Joel replied sagely.

_Not really._

“Yeah, she was.” Ellie lied, bobbling her head agreeably.

_I sure wish I had Cherry’s great big boobs right about now._

Suddenly bereft of words, she did the only thing she could think to do: she began to unfasten the rest of the buttons.

_Here we go. Hope he likes it._

 

* * *

 

Alone in the quiet garage, the horse sniffed the trunk of the white Jaguar XJ. No food in there, his disappointed nostrils informed him, only old rubber and mildewing carpet. He clopped slowly over to the back door, wondering if the girl was coming back any time soon. Another sugar cube would do nicely. Or maybe some salt. That was a nice treat too. He waited. She didn’t open the door. He moseyed over to the big roll-up doors at the front, the ones the man had brought him in through earlier, before it began to get dark outside. He peered through one of the windows, the irises of his big, brown eyes contracting as the last faltering remnants of light given off by the setting sun fell across his broad face. The girl and the man were in that house, he was sure of it. They were in there with all the sugar and they weren’t sharing any of it with him. He sighed, as disillusioned with people as a horse could ever be.

 

* * *

 

“Goddamn, Ellie.” Joel’s husky, rumbling growl practically dripped with lust. “I forgot you even bought those.”

“I’ve been saving them for a special occasion,” she said brightly, blossoming like a flower under the spotlight of his stare.

The bra was purple with straps so narrow and thin they graced her shoulders like decorative ribbons. The cups cradled her breasts, showcasing them behind sheer, pretty lace that concealed very little. The opaque lower half of each cup hid pads of latex foam, lifting her small breasts, making them seem almost twice their size. They stood out proudly from her small frame, jiggling just a little when her nervous, fidgety movements became too large.

“Stand still, Ellie,” Joel husked. “Let me get a good look at you.”

“‘Kay.” Proud. Shy. Grinning. Hands behind her back now. She glanced down at the floor and her hair fell forward. She hid behind it happily, feeling safe inside the dark red privacy curtain.

The panties were quite immodest, almost a little slutty, but in just the right way. They were not quite the same shade of purple as the bra but Joel barely registered that. The scalloped lace rode high on her hips, a narrow band crossing the width of her body, under her flat stomach, where it plunged south, towards the appealing mound of her pussy in a full V of gauzy, diaphanous ornamentation that only partially concealed her privates.

She wasn’t naked, but somehow the underwear made her feel even more naked than actually being naked.

He spoke again. She didn’t see him. Her eyes were still on her feet. She was still grinning from ear to ear.

“Turn around. Slowly.” Not words so much as a distant, rumbling earthquake that sent wonderful tremors through her body.

She did.

_There’s more of my butt outside of these things than in. God, say something, Joel! Tell me I don’t look stupid with my ass hanging out like this!_

“Sweet Jesus,” he whispered. Like the horse, Ellie could only rely on her instincts to understand what the meaning of his words.

_Fuck! He sounds so horny! This is awesome!_

She dared to look back over her shoulder, pushing her hair aside to get a good view of him. Her eyes sparkled. She gave him the best, fetching smile she could manage. He didn’t see. His gaze was fixed firmly on her ass. She giggled throatily.

“Like ‘em?”

“Damn right, I do.” The intensity of his gaze was enough that she was sure her flimsy, frilly things were going to disintegrate and fly away from her body in lacy tatters. “Come over here, girl, and I’ll just you just how much.”

She turned in place, not sure what to do with her hands, so she did several things with them at once – none of them successfully. His eyes were all over her. Legs. Breasts. Belly. Lower.

“C’mere, girl.” Another little earthquake. More tremors.

Ellie’s mouth filled every single microsecond that it took her wobbly legs to carry her across the small room to the bed. “I was going to wear them for you at the little shack we found right before we got to Tommy’s. But _somebody_ made me run around naked all day instead.” Joel eased over making plenty of room for her. She slid under the covers, the bed already warming up from his body heat, her mouth still running at full speed. “And, well, I just haven’t had a chance to wear them, I guess. I wanted to, you know? I really did. They weren’t cheap and _you_ weren’t gonna pay for them so I had to and I’ve been wanting to put them on but I was also kind of nervous about it ‘cause I’ve never worn anything like this in my life and I didn’t know if you’d like ‘em or if you’d laugh but then I thought maybe -”

“Shh,” Joel whispered and Ellie was grateful for the invitation to shut up. Left to her own devices, they both knew she might keep talking forever.

With only her head poking above the sheets, she smiled at him so endearingly, with such complete and absolute trust, that he almost regretted what they were about to do.

He settled onto his back, tucking the arm nearest her under the pillow, making room for her to approach, an unspoken invitation. Her body slid through the linen with the softest of whispers. The unspeakable rapture of flesh on flesh soaked through them both as she draped herself against him.

“mmmm” She rested her head on his shoulder.

“Yeah,” he responded.

_Should I kiss him right away? Should I wait a bit? He seems like he’s going to wait, I think. I’d better do that too. He said we’re going to stay here for a couple of days so there’s no rush I guess but I FUCK I CAN’T WAIT HOW CAN HE STAND THIS DOESN’T HE WANT TO START KISSING?!_

He reached up, stroked her hair. Calling on every precious, dwindling bit of patience she possessed, she willed herself to go slow. She ran her fingers through the thick hair on his chest. She took two quick, cute sniffs.

“You smell like green apples, dude.”

“So do you.”

“Feels so good to be clean again, right?”

“Sure does.”

He brushed her hair out of the way. He wanted to see her face, her eyes, her nose, her blushing, freckled cheeks. With the back of his fingers, he gently stroked one of those cheeks, round and soft with lingering traces of baby fat. She sighed happily, closing her eyes. She tried to press herself against his flank just a little more.

_Easy, Ellie. Pace yourself. Count to a thousand._

His fingers traced the edge of her ear. She shivered. It tickled in a good way.

_Count to five._

She risked sending one foot over to scout ahead. With her heel, she explored the inside of one of his calves. He slid his feet apart, giving her room to work.

“How do you like your first night in a bed and breakfast?” he whispered into her ear.

_Count to a million._

“It’s nice,” she murmured dreamily, looking at him in that slightly cross-eyed way that intimate distances required. “Even better than the Motel 6, doncha think?”

“Well that place had _two_ beds, as I recall.” He smiled a little, teasing her.

“That’s right,” Ellie smiled, twirling a dark lock of his chest hair around one of her fingers. “Who needs more than one bed? The Motel 6 kinda sucked, looking back on it.”

His teeth shone. His body moved to the rhythm of gentle laughter.

_Jesus, Joel? When?! Come on, dude! I can only get so sexy, you know? The engines can’t take no more, Cap’n! She’s comin’ apart, sir!  
_

“This place is way better, if you ask me.” Her voice was lower, huskier. She was filling up with unspoken needs and they were beginning to seep out.

His arm came out from under the pillow, finding her back, just under her bra strap. The big hand held her close. The other hand slid along her face, under her jaw, tipping her head back just a bit. He adjusted his torso slightly, brought his face close. She inched forward to meet him. She opened her mouth, closed her eyes. When their lips touched, a sigh of relief slipped from her nostrils.

_Fucking finally._

It was a slow kiss. There would be no tongue until the very end, and only because Ellie was going to make sure to work some of that in there. A girl had needs, after all.

His held her close with one hand, explored her with the other. Shoulder. Hair. Upper back. Ribs. Lower back. The topmost part of her ass. A little lower. One finger slipped in under the lace trim, dancing along the edge of the cleft dividing her full, firm cheeks.

She groaned into his mouth. She wanted more of that, but the hand began to move north again, up the contour of her hip, along her flank, towards her breasts. Discreetly, she eased over on her side, just a little, making room for him. She chose this moment to send her tongue out on its daring attack.

The breast that the hand found was as much padding as flesh. The fingers quickly sought out the nipple behind the lace. Rubbing it, circling it, then carefully working it free, tugging it out over the top of the lace. A strained breath from her nose warmed his face.

She slid her leg across him, pressing her attack. The inside of her thigh reported finding something hard and warm in the middle of the battlefield, a secret weapon of some kind, no doubt. She made a mental note to do more reconnaissance work in that area later.

His thumb and forefinger broke her already derailing train of thought.

“ffffuuck,” Ellie hissed, breaking the kiss.

Joel didn’t ask if the pinch was too hard. Her breasts were small and sensitive, the pink nipples exquisitely so. But he knew how Ellie liked it.

He gave the nipple another firm tweak for good measure. The way her breath caught in her throat told him all he needed to know. Ellie liked it rough.

“Why don’t you prop yourself up, girl. Let me get a good look at these things of yours.”

Eagerly she did so, elbows on his chest, levering herself up. They both looked down to inspect her ample cleavage.

“Way better than any of my sports bras, huh?”

He made a grunt in the affirmative. Both of his hands came into play now, each cupping a pleasing, pliant shape. He squeezed them, rocked them in his hands, shaking them about carefully. The soft skin, pushed up by the padded bra, jiggled and shook, the sight hypnotizing him as it had all men since the dawn of time.

Ellie giggled huskily, understanding the effect she was having on him.

“Even better than Jello, I hope?”

He snorted, amused.

“You might think about takin’ that bra off,” he said hoarsely.

“And give up my new boobs?” Ellie protested in mock horror. “No way! I just got these!”

Joel chuckled and his hands began to slide around her back, seeking the clasp.

“Ah!” she squealed.

Ellie pressed against his chest with her hands, pushing herself away from his questing fingers. With one leg already draped across him, she angled her hips, slid on top of him, made a seat of him. The blankets fell away, bunching up around her waist. The room was still warm. She didn’t mind.

“Let me leave it on a while longer? Okay? Seriously. I really like how it looks.” She peered down at herself, shimmied her shoulders, making her breasts jiggle again. “I mean, c’mon, Joel! Just _look_ at them! They’re amazing!”

She looked at him, beaming, so proud of her new figure. He smiled back, but in a subtle, understated way that pleased her. Joel wasn’t the sort to get carried away and she liked that. It gave her the room she needed to be silly with him. She could fly like a kite and Joel would always be the string that kept her tied to the earth.

_I think this is that ‘yin/yang’ stuff that Linh was always bringing up whenever she and Riley and Cherry were talking about boy stuff. I should have paid more attention._

For a moment, Ellie remembered the short girl with the thick, jet black hair. Senior Cadet Linh Suong Tuan had been part of Riley’s royal court at the school. Linh was always smuggling stuff into the dorms, like Riley. And just like Riley, Linh always seemed to be perpetually one or two demerits away from being expelled.

_She graduated the same semester as Riley should have. But she didn’t run away. Linh joined the army._

_I hope she’s okay._

_Why am I thinking about this?_

_Fuck! Why can’t I focus my stupid thoughts sometimes! Why can’t I just -_

Joel’s hands were on her body. Coarse, strong. They brought her back to earth like she knew they would. She was his soaring kite. His calloused palms caressed the sensitive skin of her stomach and all the butterflies inside began to flutter about in wild abandon. She sighed. She loved those hands. She loved each and every callous. A new name for the horse popped into her head. A secret name. She smiled, and for a few moments she didn’t have any thoughts that needed to be focused.

She sat astride him, her thighs hugging him tight, as he explored her with his magical hands. She felt his forearms under her fingers; her hands had sought them out. They were hairy, with thick, corded muscles underneath the skin. He was so strong. Often, she wanted to be strong like he was. Other times, she was glad she wasn’t. She liked the difference between them. She hated being short, unless she was standing next to him. Then it was different. She couldn’t say why exactly, but she loved the all the ways in which the two of them were not the same. Riley was taller, faster, darker. Different. This was like that, but even moreso. She groaned. It was becoming very difficult to think. His hands. The entire universe was just his hands.

His hands were on her hips, insistent. She complied. She scooted back, a wiggling walk on her butt cheeks.

“oh man”

He was hard and ready, wrapped up inside his underwear, pressed against her pussy lips. They tingled, yearning against the pretty purple lace.

“fuck joel… lets do it”

He pushed his hips up, pressed himself more firmly against her barely concealed sex. She exhaled, long and slow.

“mmm… nice” she whispered.

“Yeah.”

Her hips pressed back against him, knowing what do to, knowing what she needed, what he needed.

She groaned from somewhere deep inside her. It rattled up through her throat. Shuddered out of an open mouth. Evaporated away somewhere in the warm air above her tipped-back head.

“lets fuck… i want to…”

“You’re too young,” he husked, his hands firm on her hips as they swayed and danced to a slow, unheard song.

She leaned forward (how long had she been leaning back like that?), placed her hands on his stomach, didn’t stop grinding against him.

“Don’t say that,” she whispered, more in control of herself now.

“It’s true, Ellie.”

“Who cares? Who’s gonna know? _Nobody_ , that’s who.”

“ _You_ will,” Joel said in that caring, parental tone that she could never decide if she liked or not. “And I don’t want you lookin’ back on this one day and regrettin’ it… or thinkin’ I took advantage of you.”

The words hurt, but only a little, though she knew he didn’t want them to. She hated being so young. It wasn’t her fault. But the words meant he cared too. Cared about her. Cared in a way that seemed foolish and old-fashioned and she wondered why, of the few ways in which he was still clinging to a way of life that had been gone a long, long time, why hang on to this one? That world was twenty years ago. Ancient history. Who could even remember that far back? Not her. But still, he cared, and that wasn’t nothing, as he would have said. And caring, the simple act of giving a damn, wasn’t something Joel did much of any more. He cared about her and that mattered. So few people ever had. It meant the world to her.

_Maybe it’s Sarah. Maybe he wouldn’t want somebody doing this stuff with her if she were in my place._

_But I’ve seen the photo of her. She was a lot younger than me! She was just a kid! How much older do I need to be?_

“February!” she said, with sudden, glorious, perfect insight. “I’ll be fifteen in February!”

Joel said nothing. His hands were stroking her silky soft thighs. He could feel the muscles there, stiff, flexing, steadying her as she worked her hips. Flesh on flesh. She on he. Yin on yang, which Ellie would have happily told him all about if only he had asked.

Doggedly, she persisted. This was the answer to their problems, and she wouldn’t let it pass by unacknowledged.

“Okay, Joel? When February gets here, we do it. Okay?”

“This far north?” Joel mumbled, his voice strained, trying to smirk, trying to tease. “That’ll be the middle of winter, darlin’. You don’t want me freezin’ my wing-wang off, do you?”

She giggled but didn’t give up.

“Valentine’s Day,” she corrected. Her hips never stopped. “It’ll be romantic!”

“You were born on Valentine’s Day?” Joel asked hoarsely, distracted by the serpentine dance her pussy was having with his cock. It was his turn to lose focus for a while.

“The twenty-second,” she mumbled, half through her teeth. She grunted. Words were harder to make than they were a minute ago. Time to put them away soon. “But close enough.”

Nothing else was said for a while. Maybe a minute? Maybe an hour? Maybe just a few seconds. Time became stretchy and thin, so thin you could have held it up to the window next to the bed and seen the little scrap of daylight left peeping through it just like the Play-Doh the nuns had at the orphanage. Ellie made horses out of the Play-Doh. She made people sometimes, too. Families, just like the one she wanted so much. A family with a horse. The boys made guns and swords and dicks out of the Play-Doh and chased the girls around with them until the nuns made them stop.

_Man, those poor nuns never knew what they were missing. Dicks are amazing._

Maybe she thought that. Or maybe she only thought it up later and inserted it into the memory of the bed and breakfast without realizing it. Coherent thought was hard to come by on nights like these. Memories twisted and curled around like Play-Doh, taking shape, losing shape, always going back in the box for safekeeping.

“Jesus, Ellie.”

The dance was becoming faster, the tempo irresistible. Everyone loved to dance, even grumpy old guys with the amazing boy parts nuns knew nothing about but especially teenage girls wearing their sexiest underwear which felt so fucking silly when they put in on all alone in the room hoping they weren’t about to make a giant fool of themselves when he finished brushing his teeth and it didn’t cover very much and what girl would want to wear something so delicate and easy to rip until she saw how her guy looked at her in them and then it became like a magic spell like the ones in the books about the wizard girl that she used to have on the bookcase where Riley was always threatening to make her sleep at night because freshmen didn’t deserve bed privileges because everyone knew freshmen were dumb and short and seniors were sexy and cool.

“joel… ffffuck…”

She wanted to lie down against him, to press her whole body on him, to be face to face with him. But she was too short and she knew it. She couldn’t snuggle her cheek against his beard and keep her aching pussy sliding against his cock at the same time. Snuggling could wait. She hunched forward at the waist instead, bringing more of her weight on to him. Her sizzling cunt needed the extra weight. It was more satisfying. He didn’t complain. She reached down frantically, adjusted the length of him, merely a minor course correction, keeping him lined up right where she needed him most. Her small hands were clumsy. Her fingers didn’t want to work right. Her chin was against her breastbone. Plump lips. An open mouth. Ragged breaths. Her draping hair was parted along the back of her neck, half on either side of her head. It rippled and danced about. She was sure Joel couldn’t see her face. She wanted to make eye contact but her head wouldn’t cooperate. She felt her breasts as they bobbled and bounced inside her bra. He was probably looking at them. That’s what guys did and Joel was absolutely a guy. She wasn’t surprised when she soon felt his hands working the bra clasp. ‘No,’ she wanted to joke, ‘not my new boobs!’ but she grunted and gasped instead, every word faraway and locked up until later, moving her arms, letting him slide the bra off. It landed on the flood. She didn’t care where. Her breasts were free but it was still hard to breathe. Joel caressed them. She wanted him to be rougher with her tits. She hissed something that was supposed to be words but wasnt but he understood or maybe he just guessed and then there was pain not too much just the right amount and it kept getting worse and better she was wailing sobbing hurting so good and he didnt stop and she couldnt stop and this was how fires got started rubbing things together rubbing them faster and faster making heat somuch heat rubbing sticks and shit like that and this was a fucking treetrunk she was straddling andthe world was dark from all her hair this was why she usually kept it in a ponytail and the sun going away and all she could see in the shadows was his chesthair and it was sweaty and the muscles underneath the hair were so big and his skin was shiny and he was breathing hard or was that her or maybe both of them and she wanted to keep her eyes open she reallyreally did but she couldnt and her thighs were trembling and slick and the rest of the world that wasnt her and joel was warm on her back where the sweat was starting to run down in little trickles and air was hissing through her clenched teeth and her pussy was on fire and the flames were spreading and the whole stupid bed was gonna catch fire and that was just fine because fuck it this place had a million beds and she couldnt see anything and she was making those sounds she always made when she couldnt stop herself and couldnt hold anything inside anymore and had to let out the really embarrassing sounds and her hair was plastered to her face and she thought she must be looking up at the ceiling with her eyes closed no light eyes closed super tight and her hair her stupid hair was stuck all over her face and she was sweaty and gasping and her mouth was hanging open making the same oh oh oh oh over and over and over and his hands were a wonderful vice on her waist and her stubby fingernails were digging into his skin maybe his forearms or his hands she didnt know didnt care couldnt see and her tits were flopping around and theyfelt swollen and huge evenwithout the fancy bra and her nipples were spraying humungous sparks everywhere and this whole fancymotherfuckingplace was going to burn down around them and who was goingto take care of the horse and she was crying gasping shivering shaking moaning and there were tears and sweat in her mouth and it was all mixedtogether with the taste of his kisses from earlier perfect kisses from a lifetime ago and she hated crying only babies cried and why wasnt there enough air to breathe and maybe somebody should open a window and the coarse hair of his chest felt so good and safe and just like home on her cheek and she had her whole face pressed against him like she was trying to move inside him and live in there forever and she remembered all her lost copies of National Geographic and that turtles laid their eggs in the sand and she wanted to do that too burrow and hide under his chest hair safe and warm until she was older and she could feel his hardon throbbing against her leg and she knew that he hadnt come yet and she felt bad about that and would make it up to him in just aminute and arms that werent hers were holding her and they were big and strong and proud and she was suddenly a dorky short teenage girl who wasnt any of those things he somehow still was in this moment but it was alright to be needy and clingy sometimes wasnt it especially when you really needed to be vulnerable and she did she really did she couldnt help it and she was loved and she was okay and she was gonna be herself again in just a minute and there was no rush because she knew he was good like that and she would go back to being a tiny badass tomorrow so she sniffled and smelled green apples and felt fresh warm tears on her cheek and she knew they were hers and that she was crying a little because sometimes you just needed to be all emotional and shit but she was about to stop and he wouldnt tease her because everything was good they were good they were better than good and it was okay it was really okay it was all okay everything was okay and it always would be and he was saying her name and she smiled and a hand gently wiped her cheek. A hand.

His hand.

Her hand over his hand.

 

Their hands.

 

 

Together.

 

* * *

 

Checklist: Guns. Ammo. Knives. Food. Water. Clothes. Bandages. Maps. Assorted items.

Done. All done. Everything packed up neatly and ready to go.

Joel nodded to himself. This town had been good to them. Careful scrounging had turned up more than he initially expected. They had more than enough food to get them to the university.

“All packed?” Ellie asked, coming out of the dining room, wiping the last traces of breakfast from her fingers.

“I am. You?”

“Yep. Ready to go… I guess.” It was plain she wasn’t ready to leave.

“Good. We got a ways to go yet before we hit Boulder. And it’s gonna be chilly today. Probably shouldn’t have stayed here the extra day.”

“Best three days of my life,” she grinned.

“Yeah, this has been a good break. The horse should be good and rested up for the trip.”

Joel shouldered his pack, slipping his arms through the straps. He handed Ellie hers.

He opened the door. The horse was waiting on the lawn, saddled and ready to go. It looked at him as he placed a foot on the front porch.

Behind him, Ellie spoke. “Jeez Louise. We really trashed this place, huh? Kinda sad. It was so nice before we got here.”

Joel hesitated in the doorway. She had that wistful tone she sometimes got when she was contemplating thoughts she could never quite manage to express to him.

“Time woulda done the same thing to this old house, sooner or later, Ellie.”

“I guess.”

He looked back at her. She was standing in the middle of the living room, holding her backpack in both hands, hugging it to her chest like a teddy bear, looking around, lost in thought. She seemed suddenly melancholy.

Joel frowned. The girl was packed full of emotions, and they were always right there, just under the surface. He never knew what might rise to the top next, and whether it would come bubbling up like a stream or rocketing up like a geyser. All sorts of strange things were important to that girl. He took a deep breath and tried hard to see the room as she might be seeing it in that moment.

The expensive door was cracked where he’d broken the lock. The imported carpet was crisscrossed with dirty wheel marks where they’d dragged the pair of charcoal grillers inside and up the stairs to the smaller bedrooms. Water stains had marred the varnish of the floor where he’d chased Ellie from the master bath, through the house, and out to the backyard. All the impressive, leather-bound books that had once been carefully, neatly placed in a ‘just so’ decorative arrangement on the assorted bookshelves were now scattered randomly throughout the house, each one left wherever Ellie had put them down last. Gun oil stained the antique coffee table. One of the sumptuous decorative oval pillows had fallen victim the knife of a teenage girl who had never seen goose down stuffing before. Shoe prints were everywhere. One of the sofa cushions was torn at the corner, tugged too harshly by a teenager on the receiving end of a good spanking. Several of the nice brochures had been folded into paper airplanes that could be found throughout the house now. Ellie had cut his hair and trimmed his beard in the fancy chair by the window. The clippings had only been half-heartedly swept up. He’d left a jizz stain or two in the recliner back in the sunroom. Ellie had left her own wet spots on various surfaces here and there as well. The kitchen sink was piled high with three day’s worth of dirty dishes. They’d slept in three of the beds and left each one of them a mess. The long, hot bath they’d shared on the second floor had slopped water everywhere. One of the upstairs sinks was filled with a goopy mixture of baby oil and Ellie’s freshly shorn pubic hairs, left there only last night, when Ellie had finally worn down his will to resist her pleas for assistance in performing the experiment. It was his own damn fault for putting the idea in her head, even if he had only meant it as a joke. She had looked young before, but now…

Joel shook his head at the wonder of how much living the pair of them had packed into just three days here.

The place looks like a damn frathouse, the kind me and Tommy used to visit.

He chuckled. Thankfully, the distracted girl didn’t hear him.

Christ, he thought, when you look at it like that…

He sucked his teeth while he sorted and rifled his way through what he was about to say, thinking very carefully before he let the words leave his mouth. Sometimes, and pretty much all the time with this girl, choosing the right words could save a man all sorts of trouble.

“Ellie,” he began somberly, certain it was the right tone the instant she turned to look at him with that expression on her face that she wore whenever she knew he was about to teach her something important, “we’re probably the last guests this old place will ever have. If you ask me, I’d say it treated us pretty damn good. Any ghosts still hangin’ around can rest easy now. Don’cha think?”

She smiled at him and nodded, her expression soft and warm. Satisfied, he went out to the horse and hoped to hear no more of the bed and breakfast for a while. Not forever, of course. No subject was closed forever with Ellie. Not unless you closed that door so hard that it would surely hurt her feelings. And he didn’t like doing that unless he had no other choice.

The horse watched him approach, ears perked, tail flicking, hoping for a sugar cube. The man never had any treats, unlike the girl, but it never hurt to hope. Horses were optimists.

Still inside, and alone at last, Ellie dropped to one knee, plopped her backpack on the floor and dug through it quickly, looking for a particular thing she’d purposely placed near the top where she could find it fast, though still hidden under a few other things for safety’s sake, so Joel wouldn’t see it if he happened to walk by her open bag. It was safe, right where she’d left it. He had never seen. He couldn’t tease her about it now. Ellie was sure she would have made an excellent spy.

She pulled out an old Jiffy Lube coupon that she had scrounged up somewhere, miles and miles away. It was the closest thing to money she had. She trotted across the room and placed it with great care on the odd table, the one with the few brochures that she and Joel hadn’t pressed into service as paper planes for the thrilling First Annual Ellie Williams Air Show Spectacular – sadly, the prestigious Ellie Williams Fancy Ass Handmade Trophy had not actually gone to Ellie Williams. She tucked the old coupon under the edge of the ornate brass display stand.

“Thanks, Tamarack House,” she said to the large, silent room with its antique furniture and thick rugs and any ghosts who might be spooking around at this very moment even though she hadn’t been aware of them or even thought about them until Joel had mentioned the possibility that this place was haunted. “Keep the change, okay?”

“Ellie,” Joel shouted from outside. “Let’s go.”

“Sorry for the mess!” she whispered quickly.

The girl closed the door gently and jogged across the lawn to her waiting friends, the man and the horse.

 

**Author's Note:**

> And that does it for this one shot, which was my attempt to fill the small gap between Ellie and Joel’s ride away from Tommy (why didn’t they at least spend the night? The sun was already going down!) and their arrival at the university. It’s a small gap, so I thought a big one-shot was more than sufficient, unlike that huge gap between Pittsburgh and Jackson. That took thirty chapters! Another one-shot will be along shortly, giving us a peek at Ellie and Joel in the long, cold months following the escape from David and his cannibals. It won’t be as light-hearted as this story, needless to say.
> 
> On the soundtrack front, this time around Ellie sings snippets from Natasha Bedingfield’s “Pocket Full of Sunshine” and Andrew W. K.’s “Ready to Die”.
> 
> The book Ellie finds is The Philobiblon. It’s a very old book about the importance of treasuring books in a world that doesn’t value them. I’ve wanted to work that into the story for a long time. I think it resonates with the themes surrounding Ellie.
> 
> Speaking of her, Ellie is being more observant about the little, non-survival-oriented stuff, as usual. She figures out why the horse is sniffing her (and the laundry) but Joel doesn’t. Another “very Ellie” moment, if you ask me.
> 
> Joel is talking so much more than he was when I started this tale. In the game, by the time he and Ellie reach the University, he’s pretty conversational. It was fun exploring that transition in his personality throughout these pages, and I think I’ve finally reached the point where he’s more open and relaxed around her – not as much as he will be once he realizes just how hard she worked to save his life and keep him alive, no matter what. But they certainly have a more friendly rapport than they did at the beginning of volume one. It was fun to go on that journey with them.
> 
> Also, it turns out Joel starting looting whatever he could just two days into the outbreak. It seems like something he would do, especially after he’d lost his daughter. Survive at any cost and to hell with the law.
> 
> More on Joel’s mindset: I don’t think Joel ever thought the Fireflies had much of a cure of finding a cure. But maybe, for Ellie’s sake, he entertained the notion. If he doesn’t think it’s at least possible, then why does he hang on to the doorknob when he enters the operating room near the end? Joel has a choice to make in that moment, even if the answer is already obvious to him.
> 
> For anyone wondering where I’ve been all this time, I got a big promotion, one I wasn’t expecting to get. I had to hit the ground running to get up to speed on all my new responsibilities, and there was some travel involved as well. Also, since I’m making more money now and the future is bright and shiny, I popped the question to Michelle and we (read: she) have a wedding to plan for the spring. Needless to say, I’ve been busy. But I had some free time over the holidays and I put it to good use (I hope). 
> 
> It’s good to be back. I’m sure I missed many, many typos in this draft and I’ll be back to fix them shortly. I look forward to hearing from you guys in the comments below. In the days ahead, I’ll do my best to tend to my overflowing inbox. As always, I try to answer every comment you post.
> 
> Happy New Year, Ao3!
> 
>  
> 
> p.s. If cherry is the second best Jello flavor, what is the best? I leave that up to you to decide!


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